The Ballad of Love and Hate
by pretendi'mnothere
Summary: The tumultuous love story between Eric, a struggling musician and Sookie, a freelance writer from a small town. AH. Lots of angst at some point.
1. Sucker for a Sad Song

Chapter One: Sucker for a Sad Song

I should have known from the very first moment I saw him. The way his sinewy body stood wrapped so strong yet so fragile around his guitar, strumming as though his heart would burst through his chest if he relaxed his grip even for a moment. I wanted to comfort him, to soothe his pain in any way that I could, while running my hands through his messy shoulder length hair. I imagined our bodies pressed together in a delicious sweaty haze, all limbs and mouths and tongues.

His long longs encased in slightly baggy jeans, a white v-neck t-shirt which revealed the muscles of his upper body and large black boots; he looked like no man I had ever known. I stood there staring up at him, just as I imagine every other woman in the room was, feeling inadequate. There was nothing my short, stumpy frame could ever do to entice him. My long, blond hair was wild in waves that came down around my shoulders and brushed against my elbows, getting in the way of my every movement. No, sweet little Sookie Stackhouse could do nothing but stare up at this man envisioning what those large, rough hands would feel like knotted in my hair, trailing down my back, pulling me closer to him.

It was then, when I had that exact thought, that I should have known this man would break my heart. Why are we all such fools?

My friend Pam had dragged me out that night against my will. I was recovering from a recent breakup and while I had been far from in love with the guy I was still experiencing minor (read: total) dejection and had holed myself up for a week. Pam had found me sitting at my small kitchen table inhaling a store-bought pecan pie, something that always reminded me of home, when she dragged me by my wrist to my bedroom declaring she had had enough of my shit. After the majority of my wardrobe found a new home on the floor I was finally dressed to her liking in a black, strapless mini-dress. Forcing me into peep toe pumps and practically snapping my back as she ripped my hair from its elastic and flung my head down to shake out my curls she gathered my belongings, shoved them into an oversized clutch and pushed me out the door.

That was how I found myself in the club I had never set foot in before, nursing a gin and tonic with lime, trying not to feel too uncomfortable even though I was practically naked and staring up at the god of a man. His eyes were closed tight as he sang a song so sad it had my stomach in knots and I thought for a brief moment that I would cry for him and his lost love. He wailed and screamed his way through a Hank Williams cover making him sound no way I had ever heard Hank Williams sound and I leaned into Pam, gripping her arm with a power I didn't know I possessed and in a voice I didn't recognize as my own I told her I was in love.

"He's like an angel, Pam."

"His name is Eric. He plays here every Thursday night."

"His voice—" I was out of complete thoughts.

"Fuck his voice, have you seen his ass?" We were having our conversation screaming in each other's ears while still watching him on stage. His fingers pressed so hard into the strings that I perversely thought if he cut himself how I would love to suck the blood from his fingers.

"No, Pam. He's in pain, can't you hear it?"

Pam rolled her eyes deeply into the back of her head. "You're so weird, Sookie."

I watched with rapt fascination as he finished out his set, carefully placed his guitar down on a stool behind him and ran his palms down the length of his thighs.

"Thanks." Was all he said in a bashful way that belied the man who had stood there only moments before singing as if his soul was burning. He ducked his head and walked off the small stage straight to the bar where I watched as the bartender said something I couldn't make out before placing a shot glass in front of his and filling it swiftly with whiskey.

"Go talk to him," Pam urged, trying not so subtly to shove me in his direction.

"No, Pam," I hissed back, raising my drink slightly above my head in an attempt to find balance and not spill a drop. Pam felt that the best way to get over a guy was to fuck every other one that walked across your path. It had worked quite successfully for her in her own opinion, but I had a deeply held belief that Pam was emotionally fucked up beyond repair. She never complained, though, so I let her deal with things her own way and for the most part she respected that we were different people with different ways of doing things.

I had met Pam back in college. I had made it my mission in life from a very young age to get as far away from the south as possible. It wasn't that I didn't like it; it just never felt like I quite fit in. College in New York was my first opportunity to put small town life behind me, but when I got there I felt lost and alone among the sea of self-assured young adults. I was shy and had never ventured far outside the confines of my hometown. My social skills were there, but hidden behind a quiet uncertainty that I couldn't break away from. The first week at school I spent tucked away in a corner avoiding eye contact with anyone and everyone. It wasn't until Pam approached me one day in the cafeteria that everything changed.

In a brazen move that I would soon learn was classic Pam, she slammed her tray on the table opposite of me, sat down gracefully and with a Cheshire-cat smile said, "This place is a fucking dump." To say we were opposites is to put it mildly, but we complimented each other in the best of ways. She was loud when I was quiet, bold when I was shy, rude when I was unnecessarily polite. I reined her in and she gave me courage. We have been friends ever since.

I was still fighting off her pushy hands when I noticed her expression changed and she was no longer concerned with me. Turning around to see what she was looking at I practically smacked straight into the person standing behind me. My drink sloshed over the sides of the cheap plastic cup and I leapt back in an attempt to save the expensive shoes that Pam had insisted I wear since they made my ass look like "sex"—her words, not mine.

"Shit!" The words were out of my mouth before I heard the deep rumbling of his voice in his chest. _Oh sweet Jesus, it was him_. I was almost too afraid to look up as his hand reached out to steady me. "Sorry," I mumbled and pulled away before his fingers could touch me. I peeked up at him through my lashes and my breath caught in my throat. He was even more beautiful up close. And tall. So very tall.

"It's my fault. I should know better than to sneak up on beautiful women." His face broke out into a lazy but sexy lopsided smile and he did not sound apologetic in the least as his eyes raked up and down my body in the most lascivious nature possible. Suddenly I hated him. Who did this guy think he was? Perhaps I was too sensitive, still sore over my recent breakup, but I was turned off by his attitude and I found myself hating his good looks. The sad little boy act on stage clearly did not carry over into real life and I couldn't help but think he used it as an act to lure slutty women in before banging each and every last one of them. Ass.

I barely registered the fact that he was carrying on a conversation with Pam and it appeared as though the two of them knew each other. Pam certainly wasn't discriminating when it came to her sexual partners and I fumed with jealousy over their banter that insinuated a comfortable familiarity while they out and out ignored me. Quickly drowning the last of my drink and standing around awkwardly I decided that I had fulfilled my duties for the night and tried to attract Pam's attention as unobtrusively as I could.

"Hey, I'm taking off," I whisper-screamed into her ear.

"Do you want me to come?" Clearly she did not want me to say yes. I toyed briefly with being a bitch and telling her that yes, I did in fact want her to come with me and stop eye fucking the beautiful six foot plus man who had tempted me with a sensitive persona on stage only to be a cocky prick up close. The girl code would have demanded she accompany me home, but I couldn't be so cruel to my best friend. After all, she had only wanted me to come out to pull me from my mopefest.

"Stay," I insisted. "Have fun." I pulled her into a hug and kissed her on the cheek.

"I'll call you tomorrow with _all_ the details," she purred suggestively into my ear. I wondered if she had slept with him before or if she was just hoping tonight was the night. As I walked away I felt her hand slap firmly against my ass. I shot her a chiding look over my shoulder and she winked. I shook my head at her, but laughed despite myself. As I pushed my way through the crowd I spotted couples embracing each other, tender kisses and pseudo pornographic fondling and I hated each and every single one of them for not being as alone as I felt at that moment.

It was late when I finally made it home and I fell into bed without a thought, asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

I wish I could say that the next time that Eric Northman and I crossed paths that it was magical, that he had mended his arrogant ways and swept me off my feet with his heart wrenching story of loves lost which conveniently explained his egotistical complex. That, however, wasn't the case.

Pam had called as promised the next day to fill me in on all the dirty details of her romp with Eric. It turned out they had only casually noticed each other through their mutual circle of friends and had never spoken before last night. I feigned interest as she rambled on and on about the importance of proportion on a man and something about hand to forearm ratio. I really wasn't listening at all, which normally would have been fine, but somewhere in between hello and that's nice and I'll talk to you later I agreed to go out with the both of them that night. I couldn't imagine why she would want me tagging along with her and her new fling and truth be told if I had been mentally invested in the conversation I would have politely begged off. Only I wasn't. And I didn't.

It was some time after nine and I was standing on a darkened street corner trying not to look desperate, hugging my arms to myself in an attempt to keep warm. The cold weather was coming on earlier than normal and though it was only mid-December it felt as though it were the dead of winter as the wind whipped around my body, robbing me of any semblance of warmth. I had almost decided on bailing yet again when I heard Pam's high-pitched voice keening through the night air. It was all I could do not to smile. Pam was not a relationship kind of girl for precisely this reason; she scared off most men before the second date. I made out the words inconsiderate and egomaniacal before they were standing beside me.

Pam's arm linked through mine and she began dragging me with her as she marched straight ahead without so much as a hello.

"Having a good night?" I asked cheerfully. When she looked over at me I gave her a large smile complete with wide-eyed innocence. She shot me a dirty look and kept on marching, picking up the pace so I had to practically run so I didn't trip on my own feet.

"Oh tonight's gonna be fun," I mumbled sarcastically as low as I could. I was acutely aware of Eric's towering form following closely to my opposite side. Bastard probably didn't even have to walk fast to keep up with us.

When we got to the bar Pam, who still hadn't let go of my arm, went straight to the bar and ordered six shots of Tequila. I groaned internally. Pam was well aware that Tequila and I were not the best of friends, yet she always ordered it. If I didn't love her so much I would hate her.

The bartender lined the shots up in front of us.

"48," he said gruffly.

"He's paying." Pam's hand waved in the general direction of Eric. He didn't say anything, but placed several bills down on the bar. I haughtily thought to myself that he deserved a little of Pam's ire, it would do him good.

"Pam—"I started to say, but she cut me off with a pleading look. We had always understood each other. Very few things needed to be spoken between Pam and I. I nodded slightly and took a deep breath, turning back to assess the shots. "All at once?"

"Bottoms up, kitten." The smirk on her face told me she knew exactly what she was doing. She wanted to have fun tonight and no one was more fun than TequilaSookie.

With a precision we had honed our first year as friends we slammed the shots down one after another, flipping the glasses down on the bar as proof we drank it all. I had had a habit of pussing out only drinking half the shot. As soon as Pam figured this out she had instituted the glass down rule and it had stuck ever since.

The liquid burned all the way down in the most delicious way. I had been a bit of a downer since breaking up with Quinn and I suddenly realized how badly I needed a night of fun with Pam, even if her fuck friend was standing awkwardly by without talking to either of us. After ordering a shot of his own he leaned over to Pam and said he would be back leaving us alone to talk about him.

"So…" I started.

She sighed in exasperation. "He's just—"

"An ass," I supplied helpfully.

"No, Sook. He's weird. Hot and cold. I don't know what to do with him. I actually thought the two of you would hit it off, but the way you acted with him last night I figured it wasn't going to happen."

"No."

"I waited an hour for him to show up at my work." Pam didn't wait for anyone, especially not for men.

"Are you dating him?"

"God no! No, we just hooked up. It's nothing."

"Then why is he here?" I knew already. Pam did this often. She didn't want an emotional attachment, but she wanted the illusion of dating: someone to hold doors, to pay for drinks without her having to flirt, someone tall next to her. It was not so much about the person as it was the comfort of the steps. She felt as though she should want these things so she did them, ultimately though she would end up hating the man she dragged into the situation in the first place. Like I said, Pam had issues.

She groaned. When Eric returned she ordered two more shots and I downed mine without question. I needed to let loose and if Tequila was going to help me do that then I was game. I could be fun.

In truth I couldn't be fun. I was probably the most unfun twenty six year old woman in the city. It wasn't that I was a prude; I was just terminally responsible and felt much older than my years. It caused issues in my dating life, most recently with my ex-boyfriend John Quinn. I had met him at function for the magazine I was working for at the time. I had spent most of my twenties as a freelance writer for fashion and culture magazines, content to work at my own pace on things that interested me. I had been offered a semi-steady position at an incredibly snooty fashion magazine and despite my better judgment I accepted. It was only for a short run of a series I was writing, but in the course of that assignment I had been invited to a major soiree. I hadn't had any particular interest in attending, but once Pam had caught wind of my invitation we were both dressed and eating an incredibly disgusting unidentifiable appetizer before I could protest.

The night had been particularly painful and as I was about to cut out early I tripped over another woman's heels and fell directly into John Quinn's arms. He was large and strong, bald but in a sexy, sophisticated way. I was swept away with his adoration and actually allowed myself to believe that I could settle for him until one night a couple of weeks ago I walked in on him pounding a girl from behind in the bed we shared. Needless to say that he moved out that night and I hadn't spoken to him since. Looking back on it I knew that I had never loved him, but at this point in my life I had convinced myself that love was an imaginary emotion that people had hyped up via the media to make every single woman in the world feel like there was something wrong with her because she didn't want to lay herself at the feet of a man.

Happiness was a choice that we made. One either decided to be happy or unhappy. Everything else was just fairy tales. But after seeing Quinn giving it to a brunette on all fours I realized he wasn't going to aid me in that decision and I would rather be happy by myself than force myself to pretend to be happy with someone else.

So that was how I found myself in a bar on a Friday night with Pam flirting up a storm with a random man while I stood next the man she had brought there. To say I was surprised when she left the two of us standing there would be a blatant lie. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew this was Pam's intention all along, she had after all tried to push me on him last night. She thought nothing of testing the goods before she handed them over and if I had actually wanted to sleep with Mr. I-fake-that-I-am-sensitive-to-get-into-women's-panties I might have been offended, but I was mostly just thinking about how I wanted to leave as soon as possible.

"Does she do this often?" His voice startled me. I had been mapping my escape route and now I feared I was actually going to have to engage with him. On the bright side he didn't seem upset or surprised, so perhaps we were just going to laugh about it and go our separate ways.

"Not any more than you, I'm sure." _Oh, fucking Tequila._ I just couldn't stop myself and the words were out before I could even tell myself not to say them. I watched his face register shock and he motioned to the bar tender for two more shots without looking at me.

"You don't know me." He said it quietly, but his tone held a defensive edge and I immediately regretted being such a bitch.

"Sorry. I didn't mean it." I did.

"You did."

The bartender placed two more shots in front of us and even though I knew it was against my better judgment I lifted the glass to my lips and tossed it back. As I placed the glass down on the bar I felt myself sway forward the slightest bit and turned to face Eric just a little too quickly as the world spun around me.

"I am drunk," I said in what I thought was a relatively normal voice, though I am sure I was yelling just a bit too loudly.

"Awesome," came his steely reply. After that things got very blurry.


	2. Drunken Ramblings

Chapter Two: Drunken Ramblings on Darkened Street Corners

I distinctly recall the cool rush of water gliding down my throat. Have you ever had that experience when you are just so drunk that the world is a hazy blur of indistinguishable colors that you just want to make stop moving long enough so your stomach can settle? I was well beyond that point and somewhere in between blacking out and death when I registered the fact that I was drinking a glass of water and it was the most heavenly experience of my life. Nothing had ever felt as good as that water. Not my first sexual experience. Not my best sexual experience. Nothing. I was in the throes of passion when I felt his large calloused hand take a hold of elbow to guide the glass safely back down. His touch was so warm I was either going to have to strip naked in the middle of the bar or remove his hand. Clearly those were the only two possible options at the moment.

The next thing I remember is extolling the virtues of fresh air over and over. When I drink I tend to repeat myself endlessly. I manage to annoy myself and I'm drunk. It really is that obnoxious.

Mid-sentence I registered that I was walking down a street, a street that I did not recognize, with Eric Northman. _What the fuck?_ I sloppily reached out my tiny arm to him. We stopped walking and I turned to face him, my arm still lightly holding his forearm. I stared at my hand on him and realized just how large he was. I relayed as much to him, but he didn't respond.

"Where are we?" I was attempting to piece my night together but was as of yet unsuccessful.

"You tell me," he huffed. "We've been walking around for fucking hours trying to find anything that looked 'sort-of-kind-of' familiar to you." He was mocking me. It wasn't as though I didn't deserve it, but who asked him to play babysitter?

"Well, thanks for being such a gentleman, but I'm feeling much better. I'll be fine by myself." The rational side of me slapped myself upside the head, there was no way I should alone at two am on a dark city street by myself without any weapons, but the irrational emotional lunatic side of me won out as I quickened my pace and practically started running from Eric.

"Yeah, right," he scoffed, barely even speeding up to catch up with me. "And when I read in the newspaper that a blond was slashed to ribbons in Chelsea early this morning I will pat myself on the back for being such a fucking gentleman."

I whipped back to face him. "In this neighborhood? Are you serious? No one is going to slash me to ribbons here! Do not be ridiculous." And with a roll of my eyes I was back to marching forward. After what seemed like an eternity I found a street I recognized and began power walking with all my might in the right direction.

"You walk pretty fast for such a small girl," he observed from the safe distance of two paces behind me.

"It keeps the guys chasing me," I tossed back, proud of myself for being clever enough to think of such a comeback in my current state.

"I'm not sure they could run fast enough to get away from you." It wasn't said in a mean-spirited manner, more like an offhanded joke. But it hit just a little too close to home. I hadn't exactly been popular with the boys throughout my life, only ever seriously dating two men—one of them being Quinn. I had been awkward in high school; developing curves before the other girls, but sadly unsure of what to do with them. By the time I figured it out there were girls thinner and prettier than I was ready to put out without the pesky annoyance of having to actually talk to them. College had been only slightly better—Pam took all the good-looking guys, but always offered me them once she was done. It wasn't mean or bitchy, it was just Pam and I loved her regardless of the fact that with her around I would always be "Oh, your friend…" As in:

"Hi." Me.

"Hey." Them.

"Are you enjoying the party?" Me.

"Yeah. Oh, your friend is hot. Do you think you could put in a good word for me?" Them.

Eventually I had found a boyfriend. His name was Will Compton and though he wasn't devastatingly handsome or the man of my dreams he was considerate and loyal. We dated for four years and I thought he was going to propose. Only he didn't and he told me that he 'just didn't see us getting married, so really, what was the point in us continuing on in this relationship to no end?' over a candle-lit dinner in a nice restaurant. Obviously I had been broken hearted and Pam consoled me for days with half gallons of ice cream as I lay in bed sobbing for hours straight. I was a mess. It was ugly.

And now, here I was, walking up a street with a man who not only had accurately assessed my lacking love life with a snide remark, but who for no reason was following me home to make sure I got in okay. I wanted to tell him that if he was doing it to get into Pam's good graces that he could just give it up. I wasn't even sure Pam had good graces. I practiced my lines in my head, finally thinking clearly enough to form complete thoughts, but as I approached my stoop the words flew out of my head as I searched through my too large bag for my keys.

"I don't know why half this shit is in here," I mumbled to myself before shoving several envelopes and a paperback into my mouth. I then proceeded to sit down on my freezing cold cement stoop and systematically empty the contents of my purse as he towered over me. I noticed he was trying to block the wind from me and I drunkenly thought that it was quite possibly the sweetest gesture any man had ever shown me. After I finished this thought I heard his muffled snickers and I froze thinking that I might have voiced my musings out loud. I did that a lot; I said things out loud without meaning to simply because I was so deep inside my own mind that I tended to zone out.

He hand reached down and removed the book and papers from my mouth. I tried to pull away; a little frantic that I might have drooled all over them and he would put his hands on my soggy cootie soaked belongings. If I did, though, he didn't seem to notice as he pulled the book closer to his face.

"_The Hottest State_?" He asked skeptically and I looked up at him to see one of his eyebrows was raised high in a playful arch. He really was kind of beautiful. The light from the street backlit him and his long blond hair glowed just slightly. Of course it could have been an alcohol aura informing me that I was well on my way to death's door from a toxic overdose, but nevertheless he was a breathtaking sight. I internally sighed and mentally scolded myself for even allowing my girlie bits to register how fuckable he was. Of course he was attracted to Pam; what would a guy like that ever do with me?

"Ethan Hawke is a much better writer than people give him credit for. Besides, I like it. He's such a dickweed and yet you still kind of root for him and want him to end up with the girl even though he treats her like shit and for fuck's sake if it is based on a real girl then I feel so bad for her because he writes her like some sort of emotional psycho. And besides sometimes girls just have emotions and men blow them out of proportion because they don't deal with things the same ways, but that's the point isn't it? I mean, if men and women dealt with things the same what would be the point? Men should just shut up and deal with the fact that women have emotions and we are going to express them, damnit." My hands were gesturing wildly. I was rambling. I knew it, but I couldn't stop myself.

"And still. Still, after he spends the entire book objectifying the poor girl that he makes out to be a basket case you still think that it is semi romantic and why can't a guy find you attractive for your weird quirks and slightly overweight body and strange affinity for feminist poetry? That's the fucked up thing about women. We see you all just being dickheads and it is disgusting and yet, at the end of the day we complain because we allow you to treat us this way and in some sick way we long for it."

That was when he kissed me. Roughly and kind of violently, the opposite of tender and romantic, but it was hot. His hands wrapped themselves in my long hair, knotting and pulling, causing slight pain but it was a delicious pain. I never wanted it to end. I wrapped my arms around his neck as best I could while standing on tiptoes on the stairs. Suddenly I needed to get away from him and without a word I began pushing as hard as I could against his chest. Confused and panting heavily he tried to fight against me before he realized what was wrong. I barely made it to the railing before I lost the contents of my stomach all over the cement.

Harsh daylight was slowly creeping into my bedroom setting my body on fire as it spread across my bed. My head lolled towards the window almost as if I had no control over my own body. I felt twice my normal size and had to pee worse than I could remember in recent history. Somehow I made my way to the bathroom where I consciously avoided the mirror not needing to punish myself with the horrific sight that I was sure to see. I was halfway to the kitchen when I saw the comically large black boots hanging over the back of my couch. They were attached to long, lean legs and I carefully approached the sleeping form. I didn't remember too many details from the night before, but I was fairly certain that waking up in bed alone was indicative that I didn't drunkenly fall into bed with anyone.

I stopped mid-step a safe distance away. Eric Northman was sprawled out over my couch, one arm flung over his arms, the other grazing the floor and his legs tossed over the back. There was no possible way that he was comfortable.

It was then that I remembered I hadn't stopped to look at myself in the mirror. My hair was wild and slightly matted that much I could tell as I frantically tried to push it down into a normal shape. Looking down at myself I realized I was only in a black camisole and cotton boyshorts. These were not the sexy I'm-deliberately-trying-to-look-like-I'm-not-trying cami and boyshorts. No, these were the well-no-is-going-to-see-them-anyway black cotton with what were the beginnings of holes and twelve shades of fading making them a dingy gray-ish black. Before I could even work up the embarrassment that he might have seen them last night, let alone the make the move to put more clothes on, his arm fell down to his stomach and he shot me that lazy grin.

"You look good in the morning."

I blushed. I stammered. I might have mumbled a thanks as I darted back into my room thoroughly mortified. Emerging slightly more appropriately dressed in a loose pair of royal purple sleep pants I shuffled off to make a pot a coffee, painfully aware that with every step he was watching me. I hadn't been able to find a bra, but I didn't think it was a big deal. For the most part the bird nest on top of my head covered my petite torso and it wasn't as though he hadn't already gotten a good look.

Unable to overcome my embarrassment, I stood in the kitchen watching the coffee slowly pour into the carafe and contemplated the least awkward way to ask him to leave. So engrossed was I that I hadn't noticed him walk into the kitchen and pull himself up onto the counter. I jumped when I felt his hand reach out to me and tried to offer a tense smile.

"Are you feeling okay?"

"That depends. Physically, I guess I'm in one piece. I am deeply mortified by my behavior, though. I usually hold my alcohol better than that. Actually, I usually don't drink that much."

He grinned and began rubbing small circles around my elbow his thumb. "I've seen worse," he mock whispered in a conspiratorial manner.

I groaned and covered my face with my hands, trying to hide in any way I could. "Did I do anything horrible?"

"Oh you know," he mused. "Danced on the bar, stripped for a roomful of people, and engaged in public sexual acts that would make a porn star blush." I shot him an exasperated look and his smile only widened. "No, you were a little verbose and tried to sell me on Ethan Hawke's insightful prose, but other than that you were a very ladylike drunk."

"And you were on my couch, because…?" The subtext of this comment was, "Please tell me I didn't fuck you and if I didn't why on earth are you here?"

"You insisted that the least you could do after nearly puking all over was offer me a place to crash. Not to toot my own horn, but I did hold your hair back." He was clearly enjoying my discomfort and felt no need to soothe my embarrassment instead opting to fan the flames. I walked to the cabinet and pulled out two mugs, setting them down on the counter and leaning against it to face him. He looked so at home on my counter, his feet practically grazing the floor despite the fact that he was seated so far back. Normally the thought of a strange man coming into my apartment and making himself so at home would infuriate me, but Eric was so relaxed and Zen about being in my home even though he didn't know me that it felt okay.

In an uncharacteristic move I decided to let him stay as I showered and did my best to erase the hazy memories that I did retain of last night. I remembered kissing Eric, but he hadn't mentioned it so I thought it best to pretend as though it didn't happen. It obviously wouldn't be happening again and there was really no need to put him on the spot about it. I quickly dressed in a pair of worn straight legs, a white tank top and a pale pink ballerina sweater. I flipped my head over to gather my hair on top of my head and was securing it in a messy bun when I walked into the living room to find him in my favorite chair with his feet, boots and all, on my coffee table reading _The Hottest State_.

"I like him," he called out to me without looking up.

"You would," I answered and didn't break my stride as I went into the kitchen to get a bottle of water. While the coffee had proved life affirming it had done little in the way of hydration. I heard faint sniggers but chose to ignore them as I walked back towards my bedroom to search out my knee high pseudo-motorcycle boots that I had thought were seriously over-priced but Pam had insisted were far too sexy in a bad ass kind of way that there was no way I couldn't own them.

"Stackhouse," she had addressed me in the most serious of manners. You would have thought we were discussing a serious political issue instead of footwear. "Girls like you need all the help you can get in projecting the right image. You _need_ these boots."

I had pretended to be offended about the girl's like me comment, but I knew what she meant. I was tragically girl next door and no matter how much black leather and dark makeup I wore I would always have a sweet and innocent vibe about me. No man wants to fuck cute, which is precisely why I was the friend and Pam couldn't keep her men's names straight. I caved and bought the boots.

When I re-entered the living room he placed the book still open into his lap. I tossed his heavy wool coat to him as I pulled my own on, struggling briefly with the sleeves.

"Where are we going?" He asked and for a moment I thought he actually sounded excited.

"We are not going anyway. I am going out and you are leaving." It sounded much bitchier out loud and I winced slightly, but maintained my ground and all but tapped my foot as he slowly raised himself from the chair and put his coat on.

"Can I borrow this?" He held up the worn copy of my book. I had gotten in high school and that particular copy held a lot of sentimental value to me. I shrugged my shoulders and decided it would be easier to replace it if it got him out of my apartment.

"Yeah, take it. I can buy another copy."

"I'll return it. I'm no book thief. Don't you believe me?" He batted his eyelashes in a comical oh-so-innocent expression. The fact that this giant man-child was batting his eyelashes at all was quite the sight, but throw in the pouty, quivering bottom lip and it was just too much for words. Eric was strange, hot and cold, Pam had said and now I understood what she meant.

I honest to god snorted. "When on earth will we see each other again? Just take it, it's cool." I knew he was standing there as I gathered my things together but I wasn't sure what he was waiting for. When I finally looked up to him I saw the hurt in his eyes.

"Why wouldn't we see each other again?" His voice was steely and accusatory. I didn't have an answer. Was Eric really asking if he could see me? I knew my recollection of the previous night's events were somewhat few and far between, but I thought I had gotten all the major moments. I remembered the kiss after all. Could there really be something I was missing?

"Uh—"I stammered, but really couldn't think of a single word.

"Sookie?" It was the first time he had said my name. I wasn't even sure that he knew my name. It sounded like a symphony rolling off his tongue and I desperately wanted to hear him say it again. He began walking towards me like a predator stalking his prey. In two smooth strides he was in front of me staring down from his impossible height awaiting an answer when I wasn't even sure of the question.

"I guess we'll see each other around." I said it quietly hating that I could hear my voice quivering. I had meant it to sound sexy and nonchalant, but it came out timid and frightened.

"Okay," he said. He was standing so close that I could practically feel my body reverberate with his words. A part of me longed to close the short distance between us and place my palms flat against his chest. I was certain that there I would find a smooth, yet bony expanse of skin that would send me spiraling into whatever rabbit hole women normally threw themselves into upon encountering this man. My imaginary self was gently stroking his bare chest as we lay in bed on this lazy Sunday morning while he softly sang early Bob Dylan songs in my ear in between laying light, wet kisses along my neck and jaw.

I swallowed thickly as I vaguely took note of the intimate proximity we were still in. I had been staring at his chest, just barely visible above the zipper of his coat and the deep v of white t-shirt, lost in my fantasies. "Ready?" I croaked out.

"Always," he purred. And just like that the façade fell back into place. I shook off my fantasies and told myself I needed to get laid. It hadn't been that long since Quinn, but obviously I needed it.

While we stood awkwardly on the street where we had kissed so frantically the night before I debated running away to avoid the uncomfortable parting conversation. Something held me there, though. Something greater than myself I would like to think, but I have always been a cynic. It was probably more like that I was a glutton for punishment.

"So…" I started off. "This is awkward." No use pussyfooting around, my Gran would always say.

"What's your last name?" Was he serious?

"Stackhouse."

"Stackhouse. Sookie Stackhouse." He tried my name out slowly and loudly. I noticed several people walking down the street turn to look at us. I knew I was blushing furiously and I was begging internally that he would just end this torture. "I'll see you soon, Sookie Stackhouse."

He flashed that sexy smile and bent down to brush his lips against mine. I turned my head at the last second so that his lips didn't connect with mine, but rather my cheek. The rough stubble on his face scratched against my skin and I inhaled deeply, committing to memory his unique slightly smoky scent. He chuckled deep in his throat and I swear I have never heard a man make a sexier noise. A very specific part of me was melting and as much as I wanted to ravage him with my mouth I pulled away and began backing up down the street. "Yeah, see you." It was not my finest moment, but I couldn't bear to face him so I began walking towards Pam's apartment not bothering to even look back over my shoulder to see if he was watching.


	3. An Untitled Interlude

Chapter 3: An Untitled Interlude

"Pam?" I called out into her apartment. I dropped my keys into the dish on the table in the hallway and shifted the coffee tray I was carrying so that it was no longer balancing in between my arm and my chest. The best thing Pam and I ever did was exchange keys.

"Bed." She called out just as loudly even though I was only a room away now. I stopped in the doorway and saw her legs peeking out from the corner of the blanket.

"Hung over?" I asked sympathetically and she moved so that she was now sitting up and took the coffees from me. I laid the brown paper bag I was carrying down into the massive fluff of the down comforter and tossed several glossy magazines in her direction.

"You have no idea. I'm sorry I left you." She pouted her bottom lip and looked up at me from under lashes as she pulled our coffees from the styrofoam tray handing me back mine before chucking the tray onto the floor.

I laughed and rolled my eyes then shucked my boots and crawled down the bed to get under the covers with her. I wiggled down into the mountains of blankets and reached blindly with my free hand for the bag I had discarded moments earlier.

"You are lucky I love you. But I was so drunk, Pam." I cringed. I knew I would have to tell her everything. How Eric had taken me home, how he had kissed me, the awkward awkwardness of it all. It was beyond embarrassing, but I hoped that mapping it all out for her would give me some insight to the mysterious Eric.

"Did you get home okay?" She was pulling a scone from the bag making a decent amount of noise, so I lifted my coffee to my lips as I blurted it out. "What? Slow down. Who took you home?"

I sighed. "Eric took me home." Pam gasped in a combination of surprise and excitement so I recounted the story of my drunken night and awkward morning. When I was finished she was laying with her head in my lap staring up at me as I tried to avoid her eyes.

"Sook, it really doesn't sound that bad."

"Oh, Pam," I groaned. "It was so much worse." I pulled a pillow up from the bed and wrapped it around my head. I could feel the blush burning up my cheeks, something that only served to further embarrass me and deepen the blush. It was a no win situation.

Pam pulled the pillow away from my face and regarded me sternly. "Doubtful," was all she said.

"First of all I was nothing but a complete bitch to him from the second we met. Then the guy has the decency to make sure that I get home unharmed and I shit on his entire gender while simultaneously confirming his worst fears that all women are fucking lunatics."

"Well, look on the bright side. He kissed you."

"I almost vomited on him."

"Not because of the kiss, right?"

"No the kiss was good."

"So there's that. When are you going to see him again?"

"Never." I knew she was trying to be helpful, but it was more helpful to allow myself to wallow in self-deprecation for a while and fully absorb my incompetence with the opposite sex.

"Sookie," she chided.

I really didn't know what to make of Eric. Our interaction had been seriously limited and mostly unpleasant, but for some reason I couldn't stop thinking about him. More so I couldn't stop thinking about the man I had seen on stage. My brain was having a hard time reconciling the fact that the vulnerable sex god on guitar was the same man as the cocky son of a bitch who approached strange women and expected them to melt under his gaze.

"What his story? Did you know him before you slept with him?" I remembered them seeming very comfortable the other night as I stood awkwardly on the fringe. I worried briefly that I had allowed a man I didn't know to stay in my apartment. For all I knew he could have been a psycho serial killer and though I doubted Pam would knowingly sleep with a mass murder, one never knew. Pam had awful taste in men.

"I told you about him months ago. He's in Dave's band."

I vaguely recalled Dave's band. The past few months had been hectic for me. Work was somewhat scarce and my relationship with Quinn had been slowly unraveling. Looking back on it, perhaps I had known the entire time that he had been cheating on me. Just the little things like vague answers when I wanted to know where he was going and who was there or his phone, which usually he threw onto the kitchen counter when he got home from work began to never leave his pocket. A little part of me knew that we weren't forever and I think that instead of dealing with it I had just acted as though everything was fine. I even think that I would have ended it soon, but the sight of the man I had slept next to for two years fucking a girl in the very bed we slept in had just been unnecessarily cruel.

During this time Pam had started seeing Dave. It wasn't serious, nothing with Pam ever was, but they spent a lot of time together. They stopped dating after a few weeks, but she continued to hang out with him and his band at the club. I had fuzzy recollections of her mentioning a "sexy Viking-type", but I hadn't put the pieces together. She had been trying to get me to go out with her for weeks. Somehow sitting home alone while Quinn of off doing God knows what was far more appealing.

"I was so mean," I admitted quietly.

"You've been hurting. Sometimes it's excusable to be a raging bitch." She wrapped her thin arms around my body and leaned her head against mine. I never had a sister, but Pam did a wonderful job of filling that role.

"The kiss was nice."

"It sounded nice," she said.

"It was," I responded.

It was almost two weeks later that I found myself standing in a bookstore three days before Christmas Eve staring at the best sellers section. Every year I found myself swearing that next year would be the year that I got my shit together and finished my shopping on time and every year I failed to deliver. Which was why I was frantically reading the back covers of random books in an attempt to buy presents for my family back home. It was the last day of the year that I could ship items standard mail in time for them to arrive in Louisiana before Christmas.

My parents had died when I was six leaving my brother and me in the care of my mother's mother who we affectionately referred to as Gran. She was not your typical grandparent, but she was the only parental figure I knew and she had done her very best raising Jason and I. I often regretted the fact that I left home and very rarely visited, especially since my Gran was getting on in age and I wasn't sure how many years I would have left to visit her. Louisiana wasn't a pleasant place for me to visit, though, and if it were not for my family I doubt I would have ever returned. Jason had married several years ago, to a woman named Crystal whom I had only met once, and that had been the last time I had set foot in my hometown of Bon Temps. He had a son I had never met, though Gran regularly sent me pictures and regaled me with stories of her great-grandson over the phone. I usually felt deeply guilty after these phone calls, but it still wasn't enough to drag me back. I had anticipated spending the holidays with Quinn, but clearly those plans had fallen through and I was too broke to afford the plane tickets so I would be spending the holiday season by myself. Thus the frantic shopping to make up for the fact that I wouldn't be seeing them for Christmas this year, yet again.

As I held a book in either hand trying to determine which said Happy-Holidays-to-my-estranged-brother's-wife I heard a familiar voice.

"That one."

I looked up in confusion only to find myself staring at Eric. He leaned casually against the bookshelf with his hands shoved deep in his pockets. A flutter began deep in my belly and I was inexplicably nervous and unsure of myself. Not knowing what else to do I decided that I would play it cool.

"This one?" I asked, holding up the book in my left hand. It was a raunchy vampire story that had been advertised as Twilight for adults. I wasn't sure if Crystal had any interest in vampires, but it seemed general enough without feeling thoughtless. The other option was a weepy tale of two lovers who were kept apart for years only to find one another on their deathbeds in a cancer ward. That one was really speaking to me.

"Yes," he responded quite seriously as if he had just solved world hunger. "That one."

I'm not sure what it was about the way he looked at me, but I laughed out loud. Much louder than I had intended to and as I recovered from the cackle I had just let loose I noticed people giving me dirty looks.

"You don't even know who it's for," I retorted with a slight roll of my eyes.

He leaned in close, hands still in pockets, and I could almost feel his breath on my lips. "Don't you trust me, Sookie Stackhouse?"

I cleared my throat and looked down at the ground. He took the book from my right hand, his fingers brushing slightly against mine, and placed it back on the shelf. He was smooth, I'd give him that much.

"Look, Eric." I winced, squinting one eye and began gnawing my bottom lip. I was never very good at humility. "I owe you an apology. I was such a bitch and you didn't do anything to deserve it. And then I was drunk and I don't even know. I'm not usually like that." His hands reached out and covered my own effectively stopping my motions of slapping the book against my open palm. I looked into his eyes and saw a kind, understanding expression for a split second before his usual cocky demeanor set back in. Perhaps he was more complicated than I gave him credit for.

"I know how you can make it up to me." He spoke low, his body inches from mine holding my hands the whole time. They were so much larger than mine, rough with calluses, but still smooth. His fingertips were lightly stroking my hands and I was finding it difficult to breath much less pay attention to what he was saying.

"Hmm?" I hummed unintelligibly.

"Come on," he said gripping my hand and escorting us to the check out line. When we reached the end of the line his hand dropped mine. We stood awkwardly side-by-side without looking at one another and as the line moved so did we, never once saying a word. I was aware that he was watching me watch him from the corner of my eye and a look of amusement played across his features, but he remained silent.

It was a game, a staring contest, only without all the staring. It was strange and wonderful and bizarre all at the same time. I wasn't sure what I felt for the stranger standing next to me, but something about his energy was pulling me in. He was tense with excitement, like a little kid trying to wait patiently for his mother to be done with grown up things so he could have his fun. His enthusiasm was contagious. The second my purchase was made he had my bags in one hand and my hand in his other, dragging me out the door.

"Wait! Wait," I called to him, slightly breathless. "Where are we going?"

"I'm hungry," he said simply as though it was the plan all along. He might as well have added a 'duh' to the end of his sentence. He just kept trucking along and I stumbled after him unable to stop his forward motion despite my efforts.

"No, wait. I have to wrap my presents and mail them today. I only have a few hours to get them to the post office." He stopped abruptly and I almost slammed into him. His beautiful forehead creased in a frown and he looked off down the busy city street as if solving a problem in his mind.

"I am a very good present wrapper."

I laughed heartily. I certainly wasn't expecting that response. I, for one, hated wrapping presents. Always the consummate perfectionist it wasn't just that I wrapped presents; they were a grand production.

As a little girl I had dreamed of having a white Christmas, just like I had seen in the movies. Growing up in Louisiana snow was hard to come by, especially in December, and every year I would wake up with the smallest amount of hope that somehow miraculously a blizzard would have occurred overnight. My Gran did her best to console my disappointment by giving my brother and me the most wonderful Christmases imaginable. The house always smelled of warm cookies, piles of presents were wrapped in the fanciest paper with beautiful bows and ribbons, dinner was over the top and far more than just three people could eat; in general there was a lot of love. And although I never got my white Christmas I had fond memories of the Christmases of my past. I felt that it was my job now to put my best effort forward in an attempt to repay my Gran for all she had given me as a child.

"Are you?"

"The best. Perhaps I could help you wrap your presents so it would go by faster and then I will feed you."

"And this is me making up for treating you horribly how?"

His cocky smirk faded into a small, but genuine smile. "You'll be nice." That was it. That was all he said, but something about how he said it was strange. It wasn't asking or telling, exactly. It was the oddest thing anyone had ever said to me, but it was true. Something about him made me want to allow him into my home to wrap presents with me and let him take me to dinner. I had no idea what was going on and being the control freak that I am I was thrown incredibly off center, but at the same time it was perfectly fine and it felt normal. Almost as if we had been friends for years.

Without any further discussion we started off in the direction of my apartment. I wasn't sure that I shouldn't be concerned that he never asked for any directions. He knew exactly where he was going and although he had been there once before it had been dark when we walked there. It had also been under very atypical circumstances, a drunken journey made in a very roundabout manner. He was either incredibly observant or a weirdo stalker. I was curious, but I held my tongue as he waited for me to climb the stairs before him, gently placing a hand over the small of my back as I walked ahead. It felt deliriously wonderful and I should have known right then and there. If a man puts only his hand over your completely clothed back and it sends shivers down your spine, you should run. As far away and as quickly as possible. Nothing good will ever come from a man who can make your knees weak at the same time you want to punch him in the jaw. As inconspicuously as possible I wiggled away from his touch only to be disappointed when he dropped his hand without complaint.

_You are sick in the head_, I told myself. I didn't know if I was irritated he put his hands on me or upset that he took them off. Of course no man wanted to be with me, I was a fucking whack job.

I held my door open for him as he entered my apartment and tried to act normal as I unloaded my purchases and pulled out the other gifts I had bought from my hallway closet. Laying out all the supplies we would need, I plopped down on the floor and set about taking things out as Eric stood towering over me.

I look up at him in confusion. "I thought you were going to help. Why are you just standing there?"

He looked a little sheepish and sat down with his legs awkwardly out in front of him. You would think a man of his height would know what to do with those long limbs, but there was something so adorably uncomfortable about him trying to find a spot on the floor. Finally he settled in and began sorting through the gifts, settling on a toy truck intended for my nephew.

As I wrapped a sweater for my Gran he began talking. "So, I take it you aren't going to where ever it is that these presents are going?"

"They are going to Louisiana, where I am from. And no, sadly, I will not be going with them."

"You don't have a southern accent," he observed after a few moments of silence.

"It isn't as strong as it used to be, but its noticeable with certain words or when I am angry. What about you, where are you from? Are you going home for the holidays?"

I had learned living in the city that very few people were born there even though everyone considered themselves New Yorkers. It was a strange and wonderful affinity that the residents felt with their home and no matter who you were we felt that same sense of loyalty to our home. It was such a change of pace from Bon Temps where people were either driven to get out as soon as they were old enough to leave or resigned to the fact that they would be there forever, but no one was actually proud to live there.

"Sweden. And no, I have no family. I'm gonna spend Christmas with the band."

"You don't have an accent," I replied and flashed a cheeky grin.

"It's there," he answered, returning my grin.

"So, do you not get along with your parents, is that why the long distance Christmas?"

I hesitated, unsure of how much of myself I wanted to share with Eric. I didn't know him and yet there he was sitting on my living room floor helping me wrap presents for my family. I decided it couldn't hurt to talk to him.

"My parents died when I was a little girl, my brother and I were raised by my grandmother. I was supposed to be spending Christmas with my boyfriend right up until a couple of weeks ago when I found him screwing someone else in my bed and now I will be spending Christmas alone." It sounded pathetic. I couldn't look at him afraid that I would find that familiar look of pity in his eyes that people usually had when I told them I was orphaned as a child. On top of the fact that I just admitted I couldn't keep a man satisfied. "Are your parents alive?"

"My father was a one night stand, when my mother found out she was pregnant she decided to have me and married another man. She was killed in a car accident when I was just a baby and my stepfather raised me. He died a couple years ago from lung cancer." Jesus. What a pair we were.

His face was blank and his voice hoarse, almost broken. My heart swelled for the pain I knew he felt, I had felt it too. Then it hit me; this was the man who stood on stage clutching his guitar as though it kept him afloat. I left my package half wrapped and crawled on my knees towards him. Sitting as close to him as I could without letting our bodies touch I tentatively reached out my hand to cup the side of his face. His eyes met mine and we sat there for several moments staring at one another.

"I cannot make you out, Eric. What do you want with me?"

He turned his face against my palm so that his lips were brushing against my thumb. He closed his eyes and I could feel his warm breath lightly tickling my skin. "I want to be your friend, Sookie." His lips moved softly against my finger effectively laying gentle kisses with each word he spoke. I was having decidedly not friend-like thoughts about Eric's mouth traveling along my body and I was aware that my breathing was now more like panting. It took all of my strength to pull my hand away before I did something I would no doubt regret.

I didn't say anything. I didn't know what to say, but I felt as though he was waiting for an answer. My stomach was doing flips and it took every ounce of concentration in my possession to finish wrapping my presents as I felt his eyes boring holes into me.

Being with Eric was exhausting. I was so confused by him and none of his actions made any sense. I didn't know what he was doing; no man had ever acted this way with me before. Was he pursuing me? Did he really just want to be friends, was this how he acted with all his friends? I felt lost half the time and when I did feel as though I knew what game we were playing it seemed as though he changed the rules in the middle of my turn. He had me turned all around and it was arguably the most wonderful feeling I had ever had. He was unpredictable, moody and spontaneous. The complete opposite of me, but somehow everything I had ever hoped for in a man. Combine all of those things together, slap them in a sexy, tall, blonde, musician box on my living room floor practically licking my hand telling me he wants to be my friend and I was supposed to do what?

When I finished I gathered up the packages and we both stood awkwardly. He took the bags from my hands and off we went, still not speaking, to the post office to mail them. We made it just in time for them to be sent out that day and I breathed a huge sigh of relief as we left, grateful that a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I was a worrier. I had already convinced myself that I wasn't going to make it to the post office on time the second I had woken up that morning, so naturally I had been anxious about it all day. The fact that everything was sent off on time put me at ease and I think Eric noticed because he too seemed a little more relaxed.

"Will you be spending Christmas with Pam, then?"

I laughed. "You seem to be really obsessed with this holiday."

"No," he said. "It's just, when you said that you were spending it alone I felt bad. I want to make sure that you aren't by yourself. No one should have to spend a holiday alone."

"Ah, well unfortunately, I will be. Believe it or not Pam has parents and she will be with them in California. I'm okay by myself, I am alone a lot so it doesn't really bother me."

"You said you had a boyfriend, though."

"Eh, he did his own thing, I did mine. We didn't do a whole lot together." I shrugged my shoulders.

Eric led me to a small diner in an unfamiliar neighborhood. It was cramped and kind of tacky, but the staff was young and friendly. The atmosphere was comfortable and we spent a long lunch discussing our likes and dislikes: music, art, television shows that we both grew up watching. I wanted to ask him about his music, but I couldn't work up the nerve without feeling like a geeky fan. I wanted him to think I was cool, not some overly emotional weirdo. We talked about past relationships and embarrassing stories from our childhood. It was the best lunch I had ever had and when it came time to go our separate ways I was sad to see it end.

"So, I know you think I am obsessed, but I was wondering if you wanted to spend Christmas with me." He raked his hand through his hair, a nervous habit I noticed. He seemed unsure of himself and waited with a slightly pained expression on his face as I thought about it.

Without giving myself too much to think about it I agreed. I had really been dreading spending the day alone and lunch had been so wonderful that it had the potential to be a really nice time. We exchanged numbers with the promise that he would call with the details and went our separate ways after an awkward dance that involved an uncertain hug and a peck on the cheek.

And as I headed back down the street alone I looked up to see fat snowflakes falling from the sky. I swear I couldn't wipe the goofy smile off my face the entire way home.


	4. The Freedom of French Kissing

Chapter Four: The Freedom of French Kissing

I must have paced the length of the living room twenty times that morning waiting for the buzzer to ring. I hadn't seen Eric since the bookstore, but we had spoken on the phone every night. He told me long convoluted tales about his band mates who I would be meeting on Christmas, life as a musician and his childhood in Sweden. I, in turn, relayed stories about my life as a writer and the inner workings of the magazines that had published me over the last few years, my misadventures with Pam and of life as a southerner.

"Favorite song ever?" he asked during one of our late night conversations. He stressed the ever as if someone had punched him in the gut. It was incredibly sexy.

"Dance Me to the End of Love," I answered without hesitation. Normally when someone asked me this question I would hem and haw, never able to settle on a single song, but talking to Eric I felt comfortable without all the pretense and it flew out of my mouth before I could think about it.

"Really?" He seemed surprised. I wasn't sure if it was because of the song choice or because I didn't seem like the kind of girl who listened to Leonard Cohen, but he didn't elaborate. "What about it makes it your favorite?"

"Let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone, let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon, show me slowly what I know only the limits of and dance me to the end of love," I recited reverently. Leonard Cohen was one of the sexiest musicians I had ever heard and that song in particular made me swoon, but I wasn't about to confess that to Eric.

"So, it's all about lyrics?"

"Of course," I laughed. "I'm a writer."

"What are some of your other favorite lyrics?"

"Shouldn't you be answering these questions too?"

"I'll answer them later. Right now I am interviewing you. I can't very well be friends with someone who has awful taste in music, now can I? Go ahead, tell me."

"Oh, um," I thought out loud. "I guess 'The in-between, the absentee, is a beautiful disguise' has stuck with me."

"Who is that?"

"Bright Eyes."

"Jesus, you are depressing me." He laughed loudly into the phone.

"Leonard Cohen isn't depressing," I protested, but he just kept laughing. "Alright, mister, you've got something better to offer I assume?"

"Easy, 'well, maybe I'm just too young to keep good love from going wrong'."

I scoffed. "Oh yeah, it was totally all me, I was the depressing one. At least mine were optimistic."

"What could possibly be optimistic about 'the absentee is a beautiful disguise?"

"It's about not trying to be something you are not and accepting that you will never fit a label."

"It's about hiding behind a carefully constructed image." Ouch. Eric Northman had my number all right.

"Well, now it doesn't even matter. I don't want to be your friend anymore." I said this as seriously as I could, but I was laughing the entire time. In fact I thought it was adorable that he had quoted Jeff Buckley and I wanted to tell him that I had cried as a young teenager when I learned of his death, but that would have been conceding to him. It was far more entertaining to let Eric think that I disagreed.

We had agreed to disagree in the end and I hung up the phone that night with a flutter in my stomach and a smile on my face.

"You are retarded for each other," Pam told me when I had seen her to say goodbye before she left for California.

"We're just friends," I told her.

"Keep telling yourself that." Was all she said.

It was true though; we were really just being friendly. He hadn't made any moves to see me and the way he had discussed me joining the band for Christmas was more in the way a little sister would tag along. At first I had hoped that Eric perhaps had been attracted to me, but it seemed more like wishful thinking than reality. The more I talked to Eric the more I liked him and enjoyed talking to him, so I was content to accept that I wasn't a romantic interest.

Knowing all of this did not stop me from pacing the length of my apartment repeatedly waiting for him to show up on Christmas morning. At the sound of the buzzer I launched myself from my precarious perch at the end of my couch to let him in. The minutes that ticked away while I waited for him were spent trying to calm myself down from being such a nervous wreck. It wasn't just Eric that had me in a ball of nerves, but that I was about to spend the day with a group of people whom I had never met and I would be the odd one out. I focused on bringing air in through my nose and letting it slowly fill my lungs, enjoying the swell of the inhale before slowly pushing it back out of my body through my nose. I had done it three times when I heard his heavy footsteps on the stairs.

Inhale. One, Two, Three…

Exhale. One, Two-

Knock knock.

I opened the door and looked up to see that his cheeks were flushed and a light dusting of snow covered the black knit hat he wore over his mussed hair.

"Did you look outside?" He picked me up much to my surprise and swung me around half a turn before dropping me and pulling me over to the window. When I looked outside I gasped in surprise.

"A white Christmas," I said softly. I hadn't told Eric about my dreams of snow on Christmas so I could only guess that he was excited for his own reasons. He left my side and began rummaging around in my apartment, but I couldn't turn away from the window. I pressed my palms flat against the window and enjoyed the way the cold glass sent shivers down my arms. I wanted to call my Gran, I wanted to take pictures, but I was stuck with my hands against the window witnessing the beauty of the Christmas I had always imagined.

"Give me your hands," Eric directed and I turned to look at him without moving my hands from the glass.

"What?" I asked in confusion.

"Hands," he repeated. I saw that he had a pair of my green knit mittens in his hands held open that I could slip into them. Pam thought they were a fashion atrocity, but they kept my hands warm so I could've cared less what they looked like.

"Make yourself at home, Eric," I mumbled as I obeyed. He then tugged a navy blue knit beret over my ears and I shot him a wry look. His smile didn't falter, though and he seemed to be getting only more excited if that was possible. His long limbs were practically floating as he dragged me out of the apartment and down to the street. The second our feet touched the snow he had swept me up in his arms again, twirling us about and laughing with unchecked joy.

As I spun around with him I felt my defenses fall and I began laughing along with him, struggling to disentangle myself from him and grab a handful of snow to throw in his direction. Before I could even put one hand in the snow a loud smack sounded against my arm.

"You are in so much trouble, Northman," I yelled and began chasing him in an attempt to tackle him to the ground.

Tray and Amelia didn't live far from my building and it was a considerably shorter trip considering the fact that I chased Eric three fourths of the way there. By the time we were standing on their stoop I was covered practically head to toe in snow while Eric stood tall and dry. I had begun plotting my revenge from the first time I face planted in the snow and around the third time I ate snow I had made up my mind that he wouldn't know when it was coming, but I would get him good.

I was breathlessly trying to straighten out my clothes and shake the snow from my hair when I looked up to see a petite brunette had answered the door.

"Eric!" she exclaimed and threw her arms around his neck when he bent down to give her a hug. "And you must be Sookie," she said and turned her embrace on me. Normally I am not too much of a hugger, but Amelia's embrace was so warm and motherly I couldn't help but hug her back. We were ushered to the second floor and practically pushed through a door into a narrow hallway. "I have heard so much about you. Please, come in. You can put your coat here and your gloves there. I would have send Tray down, but god knows what he would have had you do with all your snow soaked clothes," she pulled my coat from my back as she talked rapid-fire, giving directions to both Eric and I about what went where. It was decisive if not a little bossy, but I immediately decided that I liked her.

Eric linked his fingers through mine and pulled me forward into a large living room that had an indescribable woodsy feel to it. A dark brown leather couch took up most of the room, flanked by dark wood end tables. The golden color on the walls stood out as unusual, but was nicely offset by black and white photos and floor to ceiling bookshelves crammed full of antique looking bindings. It was all very attractive, but in a sturdy, practical way, not meant to be aesthetically pleasing but still exuding a sense of warmth and comfort that created a welcoming atmosphere. It was staggering how the décor reminded me of home for no specific reason and my heart sunk just a little thinking of my Gran all alone in her house without anyone to share the holiday with. I was going to hell.

"I like your house, it reminds me of home." I turned back to tell Amelia.

"Where are you from?"

"Louisiana."

"Oh, me too! Not exactly southern décor, but I understand the feeling. I'm from New Orleans, you?"

"Bon Temps. It's a little way out of Shreveport."

"Hmm, I don't think I know it. Tray, have you ever heard of Bon Temps?"

Just as I turned around I was met with another bear hug, though this time from a large man. "Hi?" I offered, though it was muffled by his chest in my face.

"This is Sookie isn't it?" I heard him ask.

"I sure as hell hope so since you are suffocating the poor girl," Amelia said. I am not sure I have ever been hugged so much by so many people in one day. The large man I deduced to be Tray released me and stepped back so I got a good look at him. He was tall, though not as tall as Eric, with short stylishly tousled brown hair and kind eyes. The looks of affection and light banter exchanged between him and his wife spoke volumes to their relationship.

"You two are scaring her," Eric said with a look that I couldn't discern. He grabbed my hand once again and led me into the kitchen where two men were sitting in chairs at a table covered in the most delicious looking food I had ever seen. It was like an image straight out of a gourmet-cooking magazine and my mouth was watering at the sight of all the tiny appetizer like dishes.

"Sookie, this is Dave and Alcide." They both rose slightly to embrace me and I couldn't help but laugh and hug them back, I wasn't quite sure what else to do.

"You guys are all huggers, huh?" I commented as Alcide's embrace lasted just a fraction longer than necessary.

"It's something you pick up when you hang out with them long enough," Alcide told me and I noticed that he had the brightest green eyes I think I had ever seen. He was rugged looking with shaggy brown hair and arms full of tattoos. The slight stubble across his jaw gave me a slight tug in the stomach; I've always been a sucker for well-worn facial hair. I couldn't get close enough to see what the tattoos were, but from a distance they were certainly impressive and somewhat intimidating.

We all took our places around the table, Amelia on one side of me and Eric on the other. The men began passing around each plate and heaping on tons of the small portions. Amelia joked that she had hoped the smaller food would discourage the men from taking too much, but obviously it had had the opposite effect. The meal carried on with loud, boisterous talking, each man louder than the next to be heard over one another as they discussed things that I couldn't follow. Every now and then Amelia would lean over and try to fill me in on what it was all about, but from what I could gather it was mostly sports and private jokes that I wouldn't understand anyway.

Eric would periodically look over at me and offer a reassuring smile before continuing on in the conversation. Normally I would have felt left out, but it was almost as if everyone was talking to everyone all at once. It was confusing and overwhelming, but the sense of family among the group of friends was unlike anything I had ever witnessed before and I was enjoying just sitting back and watching them interact. After the meal was finished Amelia stood up and began clearing plates so I went with her, picking up a couple of dishes before I followed her to the counters on the opposite side of the kitchen.

"They are something else, aren't they?" She asked almost as if she was apologizing for their behavior.

"I'm a little lost, but it's not an entirely awful thing. They seem really close and it's nice to witness people who love each other enjoying their holiday together."

"Ha. Just wait until you see them argue. You won't think it's such a beautiful experience then." She pulled the plate I offered her from my hand and placed it down on the counter. Then she reached up into a cabinet and pulled out two wine glasses. "They won't even notice we are gone." With a conspiratorial wink she walked out of the kitchen and back into the living room, grabbing a bottle of wine from the table. Tray smacked her ass with a loud crack as she passed and although she kept walking I thought I heard a light chuckle. They were clearly in love and I was consumed with jealously over what they had. Not that I was dying to get married or anything, but even my most serious relationship had never been as comfortable as Tray and Amelia seemed to be.

That was probably a large part of my problem; I never seemed to get comfortable with anyone. I had my boundaries that I kept in place, never allowing anyone to get too close.

"You are quieter than Pam made you seem," Amelia said with a hint of amusement as she curled into a corner of the couch. She held out an empty glass that I took as she filled it with wine and I took a seat next to her. After pouring herself a glass she continued, "Not that it's a bad thing, really. Don't mind us, I know it can be off putting at first but we grow on you."

"No," I assured her. "I'm having a wonderful time."

We slowly sipped our wine and she told me about the small café she owned. It was called Bob's on St Mark's Place. I was pretty certain I had heard of it before, but I didn't think I had ever been there. When I asked about the name she told me it was named after a cat she had when she was a child. She gave me specific directions and I promised I would pay her a visit. And then she poured us each another glass of wine and turned so that we were face to face. Regarding me with a serious look on her face I could tell that there was something she wanted to talk about, but was unsure of how to broach the subject.

"Go ahead," I said and giggled in an attempt to ease the tension. She gave me a grateful smile and took another swig of wine before placing the glass on the floor next to the couch.

"Let's talk about Eric." Okay. Not what I had been expecting. "I know it's kind of none of my business, but he doesn't usually bring girls to these sorts of things and I'm curious. You don't seem like you are dating and it's just all so very not Eric."

"We aren't dating, I don't think so at least. We actually only met briefly a couple of weeks ago and we ran into each other a couple of days ago. When he found out I was going to spend Christmas alone he invited me along. We are friends. I think. Friend-ish."

"No offense, you seem really nice, but Eric doesn't usually do friend-ish. Not with women at least. He is what you would call the love 'em and leave 'em type. Not that people can't change, don't get me wrong," she was rambling and I wasn't quite sure what she wanted me to say. I lightly placed my hand onto her frantic gesticulating hands and looked her in the eyes.

"You don't have to worry, I won't hurt him."

"No. What? No." She clasped her hands over mine and I was suddenly very confused. "I don't think Eric even has feelings. I am worried about you and for entirely selfish reasons."

"I am not following."

She looked sheepishly at me and released my hands. "I want you to be my friend and I am worried if Eric scares you off you won't like me anymore."

I threw my head back and laughed at that. It could have been the wine going to my head, but at that moment if felt wonderful to let go and laugh. It had been a long time since anyone had asked me to be their friend. I had fuzzy recollections of Dawn sitting next to me on the swings in the playground offering me half of her Oreo (the side without the cream filling).

"I think you have made a friend for life," I told her confidently.

The evening wound down and before long Eric and I were piling our coats and gloves back on and heading out into the brisk evening. We parted with another round of hugs and a promise that I would be visiting Amelia later in the week.

A block from my house Eric's hand found its way around mine. I didn't look down at our joined hands, too afraid if I acknowledged the act that he would take it back. "Did you have a nice Christmas?" I asked in a desperate attempt to distract myself from the physical contact.

"Yes. Did you?" His voice was deep and so low I had to strain to hear it. Of course, the thudding of my heart inside my ears was creating quite the racket all by itself. His strong fingers found their way under my mitten, slipping it from my hand and his bare flesh touched my own. I was too involved in the feeling of his calloused fingers tracing my palm to pay attention to where my mitten went and I struggled to form a coherent thought.

"Mm hmm," was all I came up with.

I was practically panting by the time we made it to my door. I was terrified that I was coming across as some sex deprived desperate loser so I focused all my energy on remaining cool and calm while mentally coaching myself on the fine art of playing hard to get. My brain was rationally discussing the merits of leaving a man wanting more while my libido raged on, calling my brain a prude and generally defeating all the logic my brain was spewing out. Neither of us spoke a word as he backed me against my door and pressed his hips into mine. A moan left my lips in a flutter of breath before his lips crashed into mine.

It wasn't nearly as violent as our first kiss, but it was just as frenzied and passionate. He was in charge as his lips lead mine and his hands roamed my body. I was only along for the ride as my body, the traitor that it was, encouraged his every move with soft whimpers and sighs. His lips were tender as they sucked my own, his teeth nipping my bottom lip every so often. I was delirious, completely lost in sensation. It was overpowering and breathtaking. He was so certain with his movements, the clear sign of a man who knew exactly what he was doing and the idea that he had done this with many faceless girls before me slightly churned my stomach.

"Wait." I wasn't sure I said anything. Fuck if I even knew my name at that point, his skills were evidenced by the fact that I couldn't tell what was up and I didn't care as his fingers trailed my stomach under my shirt setting my whole body on fire.

"Wait, Eric. Stop." My breathless, airy words were hardly forceful and even to my own ears they were unconvincing, but my head was warring with my body and slowly reason was winning out. I opened my eyes to focus and realized that we were lying on my couch despite the fact that I didn't ever remember pulling my keys out of my pocket.

"Too. Fast." The words came out like moans and when his teeth began nibbling my collarbone I took advantage of our positions and flipped us over so that I was now straddling him. My lips tingled as feeling found their way back into them and I patted my hair down to regain some semblance of decency.

"Wait," was all I could manage in between gasps for air. The world was spinning, my heart was pounding in my chest and there was a distinct hardness under my thigh all combining to make my head swim and my inhibitions fly out the window.

"You look so good," he groaned below me. He lifted his hips up slightly to grind against me and I eagerly reciprocated the movement. His hair was disheveled and he was looking at me hungrily, in a way that no other man had ever looked at me before. I wanted to let go, abandon my sensibilities to his talented mouth and hands, allow myself to feel good without worrying about the repercussions of my actions. But the second his hands crept under the waistband of my jeans I leapt back off the couch and landed on the opposite of the room.

"Whoa, hang on." I held my hands out in a stop motion and slowly moved backwards as he prowled towards me once again. "Eric, hang on."

"What?" he froze, sounding genuinely confused at to what was wrong.

"We cannot do this."

"I thought you broke up with your boyfriend."

"Yes, I did."

"Okay," he stretched out the 'o' sound in a smartass way that made me want to smack him. That was exactly the point: I had just broken up with my boyfriend. The emotional trauma of ending that relationship was not something that was just going to disappear after a few amazing kisses that left me weak in the knees. I wasn't ready to just jump into another relationship and I told Eric as much.

"I wasn't aware we were entering a relationship," he replied with a devilish grin. My stomach dropped. Of course Eric didn't want to be in relationship with me, the only moves he had made were clearly not romantic gestures, but physical ones. It was clear that he was initiating a friends with benefits type of situation and I went and complicated things with my stupid mouth. I assume my face betrayed these thoughts because he immediately began backtracking. "Oh, no- I didn't mean," he started, but I cut him off.

"No, I am sorry. Of course we aren't. That wasn't what I meant, I've just had a lot to drink and it's been an overwhelming day." I was rambling, but at that moment I just needed to be by myself. I ushered him towards the door, shoving his discarded coat into his hands and all but threw him out the door.

"Sookie, I'm sorry, listen to me. I didn't mean it that way. I like you, I do." But I didn't hear him. My face was burning with embarrassment and all I could focus on was the fact that he still was talking to me while I was trying desperately not to cry in front of him.

"It's cool. No big deal, we're cool. I'll talk to you later, Eric. Okay? Thanks for today." I was smiling a crazy smile, a defense mechanism that I had developed years ago to cope with the fact that I am overly emotional yet hate to display any of those emotions.

"Are you sure?" His features were contorted in a frown, but he was relenting. The smile usually worked, no one wanted to push you when you were grinning like the joker.

"Positive. See ya," I was trying for casual, but I don't think that is how it came across. I closed the door a little more forceful than necessary, as he stood there looking confused and apologetic. As I heard his footsteps retreat down the hall I crumpled to the floor and let the hot tears of humiliation flow down my cheeks.


	5. New Year, New You

Chapter Five: New Year, New You

_In Hell. Coming Home Early. Be Ready. _

That was how Pam's text message read the morning of New Year's Eve. I wasn't quite sure what the deal was with all the capital words, but with these things it's best not to ask. I obligingly dressed in a corseted black top with high waisted cigarette pants and a cropped tuxedo jacket complete with a pair of impossibly high strappy heels that would have my feet throbbing well within the trip to get wherever it was that Pam was dragging us. Unable to deal with my hair I knotted my blonde waves in a tight bun at the top of my head and went a little heavier on the eye make up than normal to compensate for the lack of effort. To me I thought I looked a little trashy, but next to Pam I appeared downright virginal. She strode into my apartment slightly before eight in what I want to refer to as a dress, but I'm not sure if it had enough fabric to qualify. The deep plum satin pushed up against her ample chest causing an overflow of cleavage that was only offset by the ungodly amount of thigh she was revealing. I was pretty sure I caught a glimpse of Pam's lady parts.

"Are we going to a funeral?" she asked in a snarky tone when I emerged from my bedroom.

"I thought black looked sophisticated," I tried to defend myself as I gathered my purse and keys.

"Its not so much the color as the severe lack of skin."

"I think you are showing enough for the both of us." 'And most of the city' I added mentally. Despite Pam's prickly demeanor she was somewhat sensitive, though she would never admit it, and I didn't want to hurt her feelings.

"Adele wears more revealing clothing than that," she said before heading out the door. Pam had fallen in love with my Gran the first day they met and had since that day insisted on calling her Adele. They spoke more often than I spoke to my Gran, and I spoke to her mostly every day. Pam had never had much in the way of parents. Sure there were people who had given birth to her, but that was really where their parenting efforts had ended. As Pam could testify money certainly couldn't buy you love, but it could buy you years of therapy to talk endlessly about that lack of love.

"She would approve of my clothing choice." I was certain of this. There was nothing my Gran loved more than a proper Southern lady.

"Do not be so sure. Adele wants you to get laid just as much as I do and that clothing is not helping."

"It has not been that long!" The driver of the cab we had just gotten into looked strangely at us before Pam dismissively gave him the address that sounded vaguely familiar to me but I couldn't place it. Opting for a change of subject I asked her where we were going. Of course she ignored me and went right back to making her point.

"Quinn was a dick. The only way to get over what he did to you is to fuck his memory right out of that bed."

I sighed heavily. Pam and I had already had this discussion multiple times before. I didn't want the first man I slept with after Quinn to just be some angry lay to erase what I had had with him. I was thinking of a new argument that would perhaps make my position clearer to her when I noticed the familiar surroundings.

"Pam, where are we going? I swear if it is where I think it is you can just forget it. I already told you what happened with us and you are going to drag me there anyway? I cannot believe this." I crossed my arms in front of my chest and sunk back in the seat. Sure enough I could see the glowing sign for Lou Pine's Bar in the distance.

"Fuck him," she spat. "It is New Year's Eve and we are going to have a good time with friends. You have nothing to be awkward about, so suck it in, push your tits out and make him witness the hotness that is you."

"You give the worst advice ever." I had told her everything that had happened between Eric and I in excruciating detail. Ever since that night I had been unsure of what I was even feeling. It had been so nice talking to him before the epic disaster that was our little make out session. Though I was slightly angry with him for being so insensitive and somewhat presumptuous I was also angry with myself for not listening to Billy Crystal when he said that men and women just couldn't be friends. Admittedly I found Eric very attractive, but I had also grown to like him just for him and foolishly I allowed myself to believe that Eric's ridiculously good looks would not be a factor. I could not have been more wrong.

We hadn't spoken since I had pushed him out of the apartment but I had received several text messages from him inquiring about my whereabouts. I wasn't sure what he wanted since I never responded. When I had met up with Amelia a few days prior she had not so much as mentioned Eric so I figured he had not made a big deal out of it or she was being very nice.

"You love me," Pam stated as she pulled me out of the cab and right into the building. It was fairly packed, but not nearly as one would expect on New Year's Eve and we easily spotted Amelia perched on a bar stool at the far end of the room.

"Oh you came!" Amelia exclaimed as she leapt from the bar stool and embraced Pam. I watched in awe, as Pam "Don't touch me" Ravenscroft hugged Amelia as though she had known her all her life. Pam didn't even hug me like that and we had been friends for a long time. I could only assume it was some super hero power that Amelia possessed that created this magnetic field that made people just want to reciprocate her intense full body hugs. When the two of them finished and it was my turn I found that I could now comfortably embrace Amelia much in the same way that Pam had. She was the oddest woman I had ever met and I only liked her more and more every time I saw her.

"Pam, that dress is something else. Don't let my husband see you, I will probably have to poke his eyes out." Amelia twirled Pam around, admiring her from all angles. It was slightly sexual, but even though I had only known Amelia for a short while I could tell she wasn't the type to cheat on her husband. That didn't mean she couldn't appreciate a beautiful woman, of course. Pam had had more than her fair share of women; she believed excluding an entire gender limited the possibility for great love (or great sex as the case may be). "And Sookie, wow. I am digging the whole menswear, gender bending, sex pot vibe here." I lifted my eyebrow to Pam in a 'see-I-told-you' gesture.

We all took a seat at the bar and ordered drinks. I was quite certain I didn't want to be drunk tonight in an attempt to maintain my cool, but a few to relax would be okay. Pam on the other hand clearly was going in the opposite direction and ordered shots for her and Amelia. Soon the band trickled out from wherever in the back of the club they were sitting. Apparently they were playing tonight. Wonderful, not only was I going to try and avoid talking to Eric but I was going to have to try and resist his onstage alter ego.

"Sexy ladies," Tray called out as he neared us. A rather drunk looking Dave and Alcide, who was smiling ear to ear, flanked him on either side. Pam shook her shoulders in a comically unsexy way and Amelia laughed, slapping her husband on his arm as soon as he was close enough.

"Close your eyes!" She demanded of him, but it was obvious to anyone with a pulse that Tray only had eyes for his wife. Coming up behind her and encircling her in his arms they laughed and flirted quietly in the relaxed manner of people who knew each other entirely too well. I felt pangs of jealousy as I watched Amelia tenderly stroke her husband's face and then saw Dave and Alcide practically pawing Pam. As I drank my martini and watched my new found friends laughing and joking I saw a figure out of the corner of my eye. Eric was leaning against a wall, his body towering over a petite redhead who looked all of seventeen. She blushed and giggled up at him and though I couldn't see his face I knew without a doubt he was giving her that signature smirk of his. I had imagined it on his face many times since I had last seen him. I hated her.

I felt Amelia come up beside me, both of us watching silently as Eric did his best to seduce the potentially underage girl. "Men are idiots," she said and spun my chair around to face Alcide. He was deep in conversation with Tray and Pam about something that I couldn't hear over the noise, but he was smiling easy and laughing in a way that had his head thrown back to reveal a slew of sexy tattoos on his neck that I hadn't noticed before. "He's been talking about you nonstop since he met you," she whispered in my ear and I pulled back to look at her. She was grinning wildly and hip checked me so hard I thought I might go flying off the stool. For such a small woman she certainly knew how to throw her weight properly. I returned her smile finding her enthusiasm contagious and looked back at Alcide.

Amelia told me all about how he had broken up with his fiancé after he discovered she was cheating on him, that he worked construction for his father's company and in general tried to sell me on him. I wasn't sure if it was because she was trying to help him out or me, but he seemed nice enough and I thought it couldn't hurt to give him a chance. Just as I was working up the nerve to speak to him I felt a strong hand on my forearm.

"Hey." I couldn't look up. Just hearing his voice rocked my façade. 'Play it cool, Stackhouse,' I told myself. I plastered a huge fake smile on my face and glanced upwards. Someone must have been smiling down on me at the very moment because before I could get a word out Tray came up behind Eric and told him they were going on. "Later?" He asked with strange expression on his face as Tray dragged him backwards through the crowd. I didn't need to say anything; he disappeared into the crowd that had multiplied when I wasn't looking.

Not ten minutes later I saw the guys take the stage and watched with rapt fascination as Eric sauntered across the stage, his guitar slung across his body, to seize the microphone with both hands making it all but invisible in his grasp. A familiar flutter started low in my belly and I shifted about in my seat, knowing that if just watching him on stage was eliciting these feelings that I would really be in trouble once they started playing.

Amelia reached out and grabbed my hand. Bringing it up to her chest she began bouncing around like a teenybopper on speed. "Doesn't Tray look so sexy up there?" She squealed a bit more before releasing my hand from her death grip. I couldn't help but laugh and agree with her. Amelia was a happy drunk and I could tell she was in the throes of drunken joy by the faint pink glow of her face. What I really wanted to tell her was that Eric made my panties wet just holding the guitar, but I kept that little tidbit to myself. How anyone could even look at any man on that stage besides Eric was beyond me. He was magnetic.

"Hey, we are Drown the Water." Eric was born to be a front man. It was all in his body, his voice, his posture. It was the casual way he tucked his hair behind his ear in a faux bashful maneuver that had all the women lined up at the edge of the stage falling over each other. It was the way he rocked towards the mic in a graphic sexual manner seemingly without intention. It was almost too much, but then it wasn't. It was alluring and whether or not you wanted to listen to the music you couldn't tear your eyes away from the magnificence of his stage presence. He was almost holy standing there.

There was chatter among the audience, but as the music swelled a hush came over them and everyone in that audience stood stock still watching the band play. I had to admit that it was unlike anything I had ever seen before, everything I had always wanted a musical experience to be. And I felt as though we were all one for the five minutes that song played. It was a song about loss of innocence, the search for identity and purity in a polluted world. Towards the end Eric let loose with a growl that turned into a high pitched wail and he fell to his knees screaming out as if in pain and I thought I would cry from the beauty of it all. They went on to perform a couple more originals and some covers, but after the raucous symphony of Eric's screams nothing could quite compare. I decided that I would only think of Eric as this person. The untouchable rock god; a person to relate to but not love.

They finished shortly before midnight and as they rejoined us at the bar I found myself needing to put space in between Eric and I. Sneaking away as inconspicuously as possible I ended up outside propped up against a brick wall contemplating the fact that I was beginning my new year alone when I heard him approach me.

"They'll be counting down soon," he mused out loud in that wonderfully deep voice of his that sent my insides shivering. It was grossly unfair the effect his voice had on me. I chose not to answer so we stood side by side staring out into the dark night. He fumbled around in his coat pockets for a few minutes and I saw him produce a cigarette. My face must have betrayed how disgusted I was because he froze half way to his lips and asked if I minded. Though I did very much mind, the smell of smoke made my stomach churn and my head pound, I shook my head and indicated for him to go ahead.

The loud snap of the match igniting made me jump and I turned to watch him in time to see him deeply inhale. His cheeks hollowed out and his eyes closed just slightly and I began thinking of so many better things he could be doing with his mouth and hands.

"Are you avoiding me?" His voice sounded vaguely sad, but curious. He didn't look at me instead just staring out into nothing. I wondered if he felt just as uncertain and confused as I did. I knew we agreed to be friends, but then those kisses just threw everything up into the air. I liked him, but I honestly didn't think we would be good for each other romantically. Clearly we were at two different points in our lives and were looking for very opposite things in terms of relationships.

"No," I said and I hadn't meant it as a question, but the way my voice lifted up at the very end I wasn't so sure that it wasn't.

"Are we still friends?" It was a simple question but at the same time loaded with everything that we didn't want to discuss. The fact that the kisses had felt so natural, that there had been no awkward conversation or prelude to our kisses, we had just naturally fit together and instinctually our bodies knew one another. It was quite possibly the most wonderful kissing occasion in my life to date, but logically, at this point in my life I needed someone reliable and stable and that person was most certainly not Eric. We got along well, though, he made me laugh and that was something that had been missing from my life for a long time. I wanted to be friends with him, but I wasn't sure what it was that he was looking for. Too often in my life I over examine things, picking them apart until I have driven myself into a state of panic. I resolved that I was not going to do that. This was the new Sookie Stackhouse. I was going with the flow.

"Yes." I heard them begin counting down in the background. 10, 9, 8,7… Eric turned to me and flashed that devilish smirk.

"Good." …4, 3, 2,1. He threw his cigarette down and pulled me hard against him as his lips captured my own in a breathless rush. He tasted of smoke and whiskey and despite my revulsion at the smoke I thought he tasted better than any man I had ever kissed before. As he held me tight up against that brick wall I could hear the sounds of people cheering and wishing one another a happy new year in the distance. That kiss would mark the beginning of the new year and the beginning of my friendship with Eric Northman.


	6. The Staggering Weight of Your Heart

Chapter Six: The Staggering Weight of Your Heart

In a perfect world. Don't people always say that? If we lived in a perfect world blah, blah, blah. The only problem with that is the world isn't perfect. Perfection implies the absence of mistakes and what fun is a world where everything that is supposed to happen always does? When one examines what exactly a world without mistakes would entail the possibilities are bleak. Reese's peanut butter cups, iodine, Led Zeppelin—all the result of fortuitous accidents.

Eric Northman was the antithesis of in a perfect world because with him I never knew what to expect and in a way I didn't want to know. After our New Year's kiss we began hanging around casually along with Pam and the extended family of the band. It wasn't intimate and yet, it was the closest that I have ever allowed myself to get to people. For the first time in my life I felt totally out of control of every situation I found myself in and it was exhilarating.

On a rainy afternoon in mid-February I was running down the sidewalk with my coat pulled tightly around my head trying to dodge the various people walking far too slowly for my tastes as I made my way to Bob's Café. Reaching the door, I pulled it open with haste and rushed inside to be met firmly with a chest to my face.

"Slow down, killer, you could do real damage with that noggin of yours." I looked up flushed with embarrassment at Tray, who was smiling like maniac at my flustered state.

"Thanks for the tip," I sassed with a wink before he slipped out the door. I removed my coat and held it away from my body as I began heading over to the counter to Amelia. That was part of what I loved about Bob's, you never knew who was going to be there at any given time of day. It was sort of an informal meeting ground for the makeshift family of "the band". Amelia, the obvious mother figure, kept every one well-fed and well caffeinated.

"You poor thing," she exclaimed as I tried in vain to wring the water from my hair. "Go sit down, Alcide is somewhere over there, get warm and I will bring you the largest cup of coffee I can manage. Are you hungry? I'll bring you a warm muffin. Go!" Amelia had confided in me that she desperately wanted to start a family and I hoped for her sake that she conceived soon because she had definitely perfected the mothering instincts. I smiled gratefully at her before turning to seek out Alcide. When I caught sight of him in a worn leather chair in the corner, head buried in a book, I walked towards him slowly while making myself slightly more presentable.

"Hey, stranger." I greeted him by tipping back the binding of his book so I could see his eyes. They regarded me with warmth, sending butterflies fluttering about in my stomach. Alcide looked far more dangerous than he acted. His tattooed wild appearance portrayed a badass rocker, but in reality he was always polite and chivalrous. It was wonderfully contradictive.

"Sookie, always a pleasure. Do you want to sit?" He gestured towards the couch to his right and I nodded before unloading my coat and bag onto the floor beside me. "Is it raining? I thought it was supposed to snow."

"Yeah, I don't know. It's really more of a frozen rain slash falling chunks of icy death." We laughed together and I reached out to take the forgotten book from his lap. I gave a low whistle as I read the title. _The Brothers Karamazov_. "Doing some light reading?"

He chuckled low, clearly embarrassed. "It's not that intense."

I felt bad; clearly I had made him uncomfortable, but I really was impressed. Alcide was just a constant surprise to me, and then again so was Eric. Alcide seemed so much better suited for me, though. Alcide was just safer when it came down to it and that was what I thought I needed at this point in my life.

"I'm a little impressed." I whispered conspiratorially before placing the book back on his lap and allowing my fingers to graze his denim clad thigh. Oh, what a thigh it was, let me tell you. It was a rather brazen move and perhaps a bit uncalled for, but I was feeling a little brave and quite frankly, a lot horny. Neither of us spoke, but the heated look in Alcide's eyes told me that he was feeling open to suggestions. The corner of my mouth began turning up of its own accord and I bit down on my bottom lip in a desperate attempt to at least look as though I was retaining my cool. I felt myself blush and I looked away from Alcide's intense stare. We had been playing around each other for a while now. It was nothing like what I had with Eric; Alcide seemed almost shy and uncertain, a characteristic that I found endlessly charming.

"Hey party people," Eric appeared out of a nowhere, his voice laced with sarcasm. I pulled my hand away from Alcide's unbelievably muscular thigh as Eric settled down on the couch next to me. Alcide sunk down into his chair and ran his hand through his hair in a nervous gesture, he had seemed fine before but I wondered if I was making him uncomfortable.

"Northman," he greeted briskly. I didn't say anything, but I hoped my eyes conveyed the irritation I was feeling over being interrupted even though what I was feeling was more guilt than anything. I wasn't sure where that emotion was coming from but I recognized it the second his leg casually grazed mine and I suddenly felt as though I had been caught _in flagrante_. Eric seemed to know exactly what he had interrupted and he simply smiled smugly at me as he slung his legs up into my lap.

"Sookie, is everything okay? You're looking a little…flushed." His eyebrow rose with the last word and I wanted to smack the look right off of his face. Yes, he knew exactly what he was doing and only took more delight in the fact that I was annoyed.

"I'm fine," I responded tersely before playfully attempting to shove his boot-clad feet off of my lap to no avail. That's where Eric wanted them and it appeared it would stay that way until he changed his mind. That was the problem with Eric, you wanted to be angry with him, but he was just so damned charming. I silently fumed over both the interruption and the fact that I couldn't bring myself to truly be angry with Eric while I attempted to catch Amelia's eye across the room. She must have caught the scene because she was rushing towards us with a plate and mug in hand; Amelia was most decidedly on team Alcide.

"Feet on the floor," she scolded loudly as she approached us. Eric looked less than contrite as his feet dropped from my lap. She handed over my cup and placed the plate on the table in front of me. "Do either of you boys want anything?"

"I'll have coffee," Eric answered.

"Behave," she said as she pointed an accusatory finger at him.

"Always." He looked like a child who knew he was going to be in trouble but relished in the attention. Amelia raised a skeptical eyebrow at him and he returned the expression with good-natured mocking. Though it appeared as though Eric genuinely angered Amelia her eyes shone with mirth during their exchange. I had learned that Tray and Amelia had been together since high school and Eric had been Tray's closest friend since childhood. The three of them had private jokes, an easy rapport that came across as sometimes less than loving, but it was when you were looking closely it was obviously born of affection.

"So, have you considered it, man?" Eric asked Alcide while absentmindedly fingering the still wet ends of my hair.

"Shit, Eric. I wish I could, really, but I've already got fuckin' Dave there and my landlord will shit a brick if he sees someone else who isn't on the lease livin' there. What about Tray and Amelia?"

"Ames said it was cool if I kept the couch warm for a few weeks, but I can tell she doesn't even want me there that long. I know she feels bad, but fuck. I can't believe I'm homeless."

"Relax, Northman. You are hardly homeless."

"Homeless?" I interrupted. Since when was Eric homeless and why had I not heard of it before now? We spoke fairly often, at least often enough that if he were suddenly without a place to live I surely would have known about it.

"Yeah, I mean, apparently I'm not," he shot a withering look at Alcide, who only rolled his eyes in response. "There was an…error in communication. Apparently my lease was up for renewal and I somehow never received the many notices that were sent to me. So now my apartment has been leased to someone else and I am without permanent residence. Better?" He directed the last part to Alcide.

"Much," Alcide smirked before reaching over and swiping half my muffin from the plate on the table.

"Hey!" I admonished playfully and punched him half-heartedly on the arm, though I doubt it even registered let alone caused any pain.

"You snooze you lose," he quipped with his mouth full. Though there was some growing sexual tension there was also just a comfortable place that I was carving out for myself with this group of people. For the first time in my life I felt as though I truly belonged, we were a bunch of adult misfits who had no families or absent families and so we filled the void for one another. I never had felt as though I could truly relax with strangers, but these people took me in without question.

"Have you looked in the classifieds?" I directed my attention back to Eric.

"Yeah, but you know how it is. No square footage, ridiculously high rates. There's nothing I could justify occupying all by myself and I don't want to live with strangers." It occurred to me at that moment that I had no idea what Eric did for a living. I mean, sure he was a musician, but I hadn't the slightest idea what he did to pay the bills. I wanted to ask but it seemed a bit uncouth to bring it up at the moment, but I made a mental note to ask Amelia later.

Now I will never know what possessed me to say the next words that came out of my mouth. I don't know if I said them without thinking, or if perhaps I maybe just thought them in my head not intending to voice them aloud, but whatever it may have been I said them and I couldn't take them back.

"You could move in with me." _Stupid mouth. Shut up! Shutupshutupshutup!_

"What?" Eric and Alcide said in unison. I could have sworn that Alcide choked on the muffin just a little bit.

"I mean I have an extra room and I could certainly use help with the rent. It's not a big deal." _Not a big deal! Not a big deal?_ Who was I kidding; it was a fucking huge deal! It was like an out of body experience; I was watching myself say these things and act all cool and I couldn't do a thing to stop myself. I wanted to clamp a hand down on my own mouth and stop myself from saying anymore.

"Oh, shit. That would be wonderful." Eric seemed truly grateful. How could I possibly take it back now? He drew himself up on his knees and grabbed my shoulders; quite a comical sight considering the effort it took for him to fold all six plus feet on the couch. "Really?" He was ecstatic and truly I couldn't see the harm in allowing him to move in with me. Times had been hard and it would be comforting to have a man around the house.

"Are you kidding?" _Thank you_. Hallelujah! The voice of reason that was Amelia. I hadn't been aware that she was standing there, but there she was, seeming much taller than usual, voicing the thoughts that I couldn't seem to get past my lips.

"Really." I answered, suddenly completely at peace with the decision that my mouth had made before my brain could process it. Eric was moving in. I looked Eric in the eyes and the smile that I knew I had put there softened my heart towards him just a bit. Slowly he was worming his way into my heart despite my better judgment.

So a week later Amelia, Pam and I sat on my living room couch while everyone helped to move Eric into my apartment. Well, the guys anyway. The ladies sat on the couch as the boys traipsed through the house carrying furniture and boxes from a moving truck parked outside to my spare bedroom which Eric would now be staying in.

"You are such a bleeding heart," Pam teased. She was lying with her head in my lap looking up at me with a smirk. I rolled my eyes and slapped the outside of her thigh.

"Ow!" she said with a laugh as she rolled face first off my couch onto the floor.

"I cannot believe you are actually letting him move in!" Amelia squealed as she stretched her legs out to claim Pam's vacated spot. "This is totally going to put a cramp in your sex life."

"What sex life?" Pam asked from the floor.

"Ha. Ha. You guys, seriously? Why would him living here affect my sex life? If anything I will probably be ruining his."

"Uh, no, sweetie. I love you, but don't for one minute think that Eric would allow you to effect how many nameless, faceless bimbos he tosses it into."

"Gross, Amelia!" I exclaimed and threw a pillow at her narrowly missing her hand, which was holding a glass of wine.

"I'm just saying." She shrugged and took a sip. Pam popped up from the floor and walked towards the kitchen with both of our empty glasses.

"I'm with Amelia on this," she yelled to us just as I heard her rifling through my drawers.

"Big surprise! You are such a traitor. It's in the drawer by the sink," I yelled back at her, I knew she was looking for the bottle opener.

Just then Dave leapt over the back of the couch to land on top of Amelia's legs practically in my lap. Amelia jumped up yelling at him and swatting his back with her free hand. Dave just laughed manically and began trying to bite Amelia's calf.

"Stop!" She shrieked and bolted from the couch, narrowly missing the coffee table as she put her glass down en route to Tray's waiting arms. He swept her up easily and held her with one hand while she held herself to him with her arms and legs strapped to his body. "You're in trouble," she warned in the most serious tone I had ever heard her use and then tucked her head into Tray's neck. Suddenly I was being picked up by large hands firmly under my armpits and dragged across Dave's lap.

"No! No, this has nothing to do with me! Dave, put me down. Put me down, Dave." I was trying to sound stern but it was difficult to be threatening when I was laughing like a little girl. He was not putting me down; he was using me as a human shield.

"Cut the shit, guys." Eric's sharp voice broke through the commotion, it was angry without even a trace of humor. "We still have a lot to unpack so stop fucking around and let's finish." He grabbed his pack of cigarettes off the counter and stormed out of the room. Tray gave Amelia a quick peck on the cheek before placing her back on the couch. Pam reclaimed her place on the couch as Dave got up and began to follow behind the others, before he had even taken two steps though he turned around and sweetly kissed my cheek.

"I would be a much better roommate," he whispered huskily.

I burst out laughing and pushed him away. Taking the glass of wine Pam offered to me I sat back on the couch and sipped slowly as I thought about what I had just seen. Eric was normally the instigator of these types of situations; while I hadn't really known him for that long I had always seen him playful and fun. This new, serious Eric was something to consider.

"Do you think he was really angry?" I mused out loud. Amelia rolled her eyes, but Pam placed her forefinger pointedly in my face.

"I have been telling you from day one, my friend. Hot and cold."

As soon as the last box was brought in I said my goodbyes to everyone and escorted them out the door. Eric was nowhere to be found and I thought that was particularly rude considering all of his friends had just helped him move for an entire day completely free of pay. I straightened up the living room, collected empty glasses and bottles from various surfaces and placed them all on the kitchen counter. I was tired from a day of doing nothing, but exhausted nonetheless, though I still had work to do so I left the mess to deal with tomorrow and headed into my bedroom to work on one of my current projects.

I had accidentally come across this magazine when I had been avoiding finding real work in a bookstore. _Sheer_ was marketed towards women in their twenties who were economically comfortable and didn't have any families to support. It was too hip for the hip and had been wildly successful from day one. Anyone who was anyone was writing for this magazine and yours truly had secured a position on a trial by fire basis. Basically, any topic they gave me I had to come up with the latest and most obscure things to say about it. I assumingly had done well since out of the ten pieces I submitted to them last month, two of them had appeared in print. I had jumped up and down for joy with the magazine clutched to my chest screaming over the phone at Pam about my excitement. She had responded in less than enthused tones about how happy she was for me, but I knew what was proud and just as thrilled as I was that I had found something that interested me.

It wasn't that I considered myself tragically hip, not by a long shot, but with magazines like _Sheer _there was a freedom afforded to you as a writer that could not necessarily be found at other publications. I had my fingers crossed for a permanent home, but I certainly wasn't holding my breath. I would continue to write anything and everything they asked of me until an offer came in, while maintaining my work on the side.

I was sitting upright on my bed with my laptop in my lap, my face raised to the ceiling, eyes closed, contemplating how many ways I could approach the return of the off the shoulder sweater to the wardrobe of the average American woman when I heard the door creak open. I lifted my head slightly and opened one eye to see Eric standing in the doorway looking quite uncertain of himself.

"What's up?" I mumbled. When I am writing I tend to black myself out to reality and once I leave that space I find it sometimes very challenging to get back there again.

"Are you hungry?" The tremble his voice sent through me even from a distance was undeniable. He had such a visceral effect on me that I found I didn't trust myself to be alone with him. I ached to touch his chest and feel the vibrations under my fingertips. Perhaps it would have been alright if we had accidentally fallen into bed together before he moved in, but now that we had to share a space together I knew I would not let him into my pants. Despite how badly he made me want to remove them voluntarily and climb on top of him to claim what I could only guess was a magnificent prize.

"No, thank you." My voice was much more hoarse than I intended it to be, but I was attempting to play cool so I cleared my throat and tried to return to my meditative state. A task that was becoming increasingly difficult since I felt a huge shift in the weight on my bed. I looked down to see Eric staring back at me almost expectantly. Neither of us said anything as we continued the stare down, then almost as if he suddenly lost interest he rolled over onto his back and lay face up next to me, his head at my stomach, his long legs dangling off the end of my bed. He began fiddling with the seam of my jeans as he hummed a song that I couldn't identify by name and my resolve to keep him out of my pants began to waver as I felt the vibrations of his song through the mattress. Damn him.

"What is your favorite book, Sookie?"

I paused for a moment because the question was seemingly out of left field. I thought about it briefly but the titles of so many books that I had loved over the years flew through my mind that I couldn't settle on one so instead I asked him why he wanted to know.

"Just curious about you is all."

"What's yours?"

"_The Red Badge of Courage_."

"Really?" That struck me as incredibly odd. Of all the books in the world that I would imagine Eric finding affinity with that was not on the list. He didn't say anything else, though so I didn't push it.

"What's your favorite food?"

"Pecan pie."

"That's not a food, it's dessert."

"It's my favorite, it can be whatever I want it to be."

"Fair enough. Do you ever miss your parents?" That was random. I had told Eric the story of my parents' death, but we had never discussed it further. I hadn't the slightest clue why he was bringing it up now, but I had a feeling that it had nothing to do with me at all.

"I didn't really know them," I admit quietly. It had always felt a little traitorous to my Gran who had raised me to miss the parents I could not even remember. I'm sure she wouldn't hold it against me, but in terms of loss I had far more than others in the grand scheme of things and it seemed selfish to wallow in grief when I had a perfectly loving family to bring me up. I know I'm fucked up.

"It can still hurt, though, you know?" And I did know. That was something that Eric and I had in common, an unfortunate pain that you couldn't understand unless you were part of the club.

He solemnly fiddled some more as I tried to focus on my writing to no avail. Slowly, large hands wrapped themselves around my waist, slipping underneath my sloppy two-day-old t-shirt I had carelessly thrown on that morning. I ignored the hands until they retreated from my burning flesh. I sighed an internal sigh of relief, until I realized that they only ceased in order to remove the obstruction of my computer from their journey. Despite my best efforts I groaned out loud when they began touching me once again.

Eric had experienced hands, that much was clear, he would lightly caress and massage my muscles until I was nothing but a panting puddle at his feet. The calloused fingertips he so softly moved across my body took my breath away and while rationally my brain was screaming to immediately stop this my body wanted nothing more than for him to continue in whatever direction he might want to go. My t-shirt was being rolled up my stomach and before I could protest Eric's lips found their way to my stomach and I would swear upon anything I could swear upon that I had died and gone to heaven.

The slight stubble of his beard tickled my sensitive skin as his tongue darted out to painfully draw itself across my quivering belly. The heat and moisture from his mouth were sending my resolve spiraling down into a pit that I was unsure I would ever be able to rescue them from. My heart pounded so hard I thought I could feel in my throat as I reached up and threaded my hands into his hair. I was on sensory overload, not even knowing where to begin to focus. The kisses were needy and desperate, passion that was born of sadness and seeking comfort, but I needed it too. Eric's need invoked a need all of my own and I writhed against him as the pleasure was sending me to brink of tears.

I had been fantasizing about Eric for some time now. Though Alcide was making the occasional guest appearance, Eric had been starring in my dreams for weeks and they were intense dreams, believe you me because I had plenty of ammunition to work off of from our heated make out sessions. I was laying back enjoying the feel of Eric's hair in my fingers when I felt hands reach around my back and begin to release my bra. That was the moment that reality came crashing down around me.

"Wait, wait," I muttered into his ear simultaneously pushing his hands away from me. He didn't move his face from my bra-covered chest, but he collapsed on me allowing his weight to hold me in place.

"What?" He was clearly frustrated. And who could blame him, I mean; to a certain extent I had allowed him to think that this was perfectly acceptable behavior. Namely the fact that I didn't push him away the second he began touching me. I am also sure that the moans of pleasure did nothing to discourage him from taking things further.

"We can't do this."

"Seriously, Sookie?" He lifted his head and regarded me with disbelief. I'm pretty sure it went further than frustrated now. His voice verged on angry, but I sensed hurt was the driving force behind the storm I could see slowly welling up inside him.

"We're living together now, it would just complicate things. If-"

"Are you fucking kidding me? Complicate things? How are things not already complicated between us?"

"Don't swear at me."

"I'm not swearing at you, I'm just swearing. This is ridiculous. You are scared of me or some asinine bullshit and that is why you won't let this happen. Don't go blaming your issues on the fact that we now live together." He was on his knees now, facing me but not looking at me. His beautiful hands that felt so good on my body raked through his hair methodically and I wanted so desperately to put my hands upon his to stop the motions. To tell him just how badly he made my body throb with things I had not even known I could feel before. But I didn't. My pride and fucked up sense of what was right kept me from touching him and quelling the anger I had caused.

"Eric—"

"Forget it. If you don't want this, fine." And with that he was storming out my door, slamming it behind him and leaving me alone on my bed horny and slightly confused. He was overacting, in my opinion, to what was me just putting a stop to some casual sex. That was all it would have been I tried to reason with myself as I grabbed my laptop and lost myself in my work.

The next morning Eric was nowhere to be found. I figured I would keep my distance and allow him some time to calm down, but when evening rolled around and I still had not caught sight of him I began to become concerned. As I was cleaning up my plates from dinner Eric came strolling in the apartment and greeted me a sharp jut of his chin as though nothing had happened.

"Hey," I said tentatively, trying to keep the sentence open as though I would say more if he wanted to hear it.

His answer was a dismissive, "Hey." And without another glance he walked into his room and closed the door softy behind him. I don't know how long I stood frowning at that closed door, but the water in the sink began to overflow before I even noticed I had turned the water on.


	7. There is no Modern Romance

Author's Note: psst, I will tell you a secret. I am not even supposed to be writing this story. I am supposed to be focusing on my other story, only every time I sit down to write it this is the one that comes out. Sometimes you cannot fight the muses, my friends, and so I present you with this forboden chapter. An actual note: Tara is a combination of SVM/True Blood/my own imagination because I think Rutina Wesley is awesome and hot and I just needed her character to be who I wanted not who she actually is. The End.

Disclaimer: not mine.

* * *

Chapter Seven: There Is No Modern Romance

Eric, I had learned from Amelia, didn't _do _anything. As the result of a series of complicated legal matters from his parents' deaths he was what Amelia had described peculiarly as "Quote, independently wealthy". He apparently took random jobs as the mood moved him, but there was no absolute necessity for him to work. I have to admit that that did not sit well with me at first. I had spent the majority of my life struggling, nothing ever came easy. Eric had seemingly never needed to work for anything; women, talent, money; everything that anyone could ever want just fell into his lap. And it made me bitter as hell. She had offered this information somewhat reluctantly as though it was not common knowledge and asked me not to mention it to anyone else. That wasn't an incredibly difficult request since we hadn't spoken to each other since the day he moved in. I suffered in silent resentment for a few weeks after Amelia had told me, but eventually I decided to let it go without mention. If we were going to live together we needed to get along and I resolved to let everything that I had held against Eric up until that point go.

That was until one morning when I had been standing in the kitchen pouring over the contents of my nearly empty fridge debating whether or not I was going to behave myself and eat healthy when I had been greeted by an entirely unwelcome sight. She was a little shorter than me with shoulder length copper red hair that looked like a sunset on fire. I am not even certain how I picked my jaw up off the floor and managed to offer her a cup of coffee as if strange women just randomly wandered into my kitchen every morning, half naked and hair tousled. I recognized her as the young girl that Eric had been talking to at Lou's on New Year's. I didn't speak to her, though as soon as she had taken her first sip of coffee she began rambling. On and on she went gushing about how "awesome" Eric was. I shit you not; this bimbo actually used the word "awesome". She couldn't have been more than nineteen with perfectly fair, unblemished, smooth skin. Her ridiculously long legs for her tiny frame seemed to go on forever peaking out from underneath one of Eric's giant t-shirts.

While, yes, I had made it very clear to Eric in no uncertain terms that he would never be sharing my bed as long as we lived together I couldn't deny the hurt that it caused my already fragile heart and even more fragile self esteem when I saw this graceful girl step out of Eric's room like she owned the fucking place. I was polite, ever the southern girl, but inside I was dying. I honestly have no clue what she said to me that morning, nor do I care. I silently gnawed on toast and feigned interest while I fantasized about marring that perfect skin with my butter knife. I hated her, I hated him. Fuck, I hated myself.

Eric walked out somewhere in the middle of her fiftieth "like"—and I had only begun counting roughly ten minutes into our conversation. He flashed that cocky bastard smile at her when he walked in the door, grabbed a coffee cup out of the cabinet and placed a sloppy kiss on her perfect little lips. My thoughts turned to stabbing him with my butter knife. It played out like a Tarantino movie in my mind. She would scream in horror as blood slashed across her pale face, mixing with her hair. I was a fucking cinematic genius of destruction in my head. And then the real kicker. He turns to me all casual, as if he knew I was there the entire time and just sort of says hello as if this type of thing is completely normal. God help me, I just played along. Everything was fine; I was cool as a fucking cucumber in a really cool time. I was the Fonz. I was James Dean.

Then he picked up his coffee, just like that and walked off towards his room. She flashed me a smile that made me think this girl thought I was her sorority sister and then trotted off behind him like a little dog. One of those yappy ones that you almost want to kick, but you would never because who could hit a cute, little defenseless animal? Cruella deVil, that's who.

And so we didn't speak. Part of it was because we lived opposite schedules, but part of it was the fact that neither of us knew what to say to the other. It wasn't as though we were fighting, but the silence was uncomfortable. We made our best attempts to be cautiously considerate. He left me coffee in the pot each morning before I woke up.

Eric, I had also discovered, was a runner. For someone who smoked like a fiend and stayed out at all hours of the night, it seemed somewhat laughable that he would wake up at the break of dawn every morning in order to exercise, but I had a sneaking suspicion that the appeal of running was more mental than physical.

We had established a routine, while a bit dysfunctional it was working. In fact, I do not think I ever had a more amicable roommate. Add to it that we never saw each other except in passing and I would dare to say that it was like living alone. Friendly, but not too friendly, we danced around like this for weeks.

The only kink in this nearly utopian existence? The girls. It was like a horrendous, never-ending parade serving as a reminder of my personal failings as a woman. Young, idiotic, beautiful girls who left my apartment most mornings of the week alone, no Eric in sight, after I had served them breakfast (or what they allowed themselves to eat of it) out of some fucked up sense of hospitality. The worst part was that the majority of them, while obviously not chosen for their intellectual offerings, were very sweet girls who only had nice things to say about the man who abandoned them presumably as soon as the condom was off. At first their presence in my life was deeply, deeply uncomfortable, but as with everything else eventually I got used to them and even somehow enjoyed their rotating presence at my breakfast table.

Only two of the girls made repeat performances. The first was the redhead, whose name was Sophie Ann. She was eighteen and had left her hometown of bumfuck, nowheresville to come to the big, bad city to pursue acting. Theater, not film—she was very certain to make that distinction. A little on the dim side, but extremely nice. I think she assumed that since I lived with Eric but was not sleeping with him that he was not interested in me (or that we were related). She never seemed to see me as a threat, as more than a few girls had, and was always more than anxious to meet me in the kitchen knowing I would be waiting there coffee in hand.

The other was a tall, slender, impossibly attractive black girl named Tara. She was different from the others in that she seemed to have more than half a brain in her head and quite the mouth to back it up. I never actually saw her and Eric together, but I heard them on more than one occasion. At first I hadn't been certain whether he was fucking her or murdering her, so I without a doubt knew what she was bringing to the relationship. A very big downside to living in New York was that space was relative. In Louisiana I would have never dared to call my boxy little closet a bedroom, but in New York it was an impressive size because it fit both a bed, a table and had a window seat. The overall size of the apartment wasn't much better and the close quarters lent themselves to disclosing far more about my new roommate than I really wanted to know.

Tara was a dancer, classically trained in ballet and apparently quite successful at her given profession. We got along good and I kind of thought that had we have met under different circumstances that we could have been friends. Alas, I knew exactly the sound she made at the moment she orgasmed and the obnoxious high-pitched squeal would always be in the back of my mind for the rest of my days.

In the meantime my personal life was in shambles. I was pursuing my career, trying desperately to establish a name fore myself in the competitive literary world while my social life fell by the wayside. At first I didn't even really notice it. From the moment I woke up in the morning until the moment I fell asleep at night my face was in front of my computer. The days passed without note and almost entire weeks had gone by when I hadn't even left the apartment. It wasn't until Amelia made a comment about me never being around anymore that I even thought other people would have been concerned. I didn't have a valid excuse for her other than work and when Pam started in on me I knew it was time for a personal appearance.

"And he just leaves them there?" Pam was sitting across from me at the small table in the trendy new restaurant where she insisted we eat diner.

"For the most part, I mean, yeah. Wham bam, whatever." I wasn't really in the mood to discuss the many loves of Eric Northman. I had enough of it on a day-to-day basis. Listening to Pam comment on it was sort of like rubbing it in.

"That's cold."

"You slept with him, didn't he do the same thing with you?"

"He was far too exhausted to go anywhere when I was finished with him, thank you very much. Men do not leave me, Sookie, I leave them."

"So sorry to have offended." Pam's eyes sparkled with mirth and I laughed quietly.

"Let's talk about something else okay?"

"Very well. I am dating someone." I merely raised an eyebrow at this. Pam saying she was dating was like Cher giving a farewell tour. Sure you wanted to believe them when they told you, but ultimately you knew that they knew that they didn't really mean it.

"And who is the lucky fellow?"

"His name is Andre. He's good on paper, alright in bed. He is in the hotel business, 42 and never married, no children, old money." Pam had just summed up her dream guy. I knew there was a 'but' coming soon. "It's just that…"

"Yes?" She was hesitant to tell me, so it must have been big.

"He's not really my type."

"How so?" He sounded like everything she had ever wanted in a man.

"I think I actually like him." Leave it to Pam to find the only undesirable trait in a man to be that she didn't think he was an asshole. In general I have always held the belief that women are slightly ass backwards about what they want in a man, but Pam always managed to astound me with her new and unique takes on neuroses.

"Maybe that's a good thing?"

"I don't know. Maybe." I hoped for her sake it was. Pam deserved to be happy after all the shit she had gone through in her life.

After lunch we parted ways with Pam promising to stop by and see me Saturday morning and off I went to visit Amelia at Bob's. I closed my eyes for the briefest second and raised my face to the sun. Although it was early April and still fairly cold the slightest notes of spring were in the air and it was such a wonderful reprieve from the harsh winter weather. The stirrings of new birth in the world always managed to bring me out of my winter funk. It was something about the birds chirping and the tiny green buds on trees that lifted my spirits considerably.

As I walked into Bob's I heard the light tinkling of the bell Amelia had hung in the door to alert her to customers. Instead of Amelia I saw Jess, a young redheaded college student who worked as a part time barista. She greeted me with a smile and a soy latte.

"Haven't seen you in a while," she said cheerfully and reached into the massive jar on the counter to produce biscotti which she handed over on a napkin.

"Thanks. I know, I've been busy with work lately. Is Amelia around?"

Jess was extremely nice and a little naïve, but in the most charming of ways. She reminded me of myself in that we were both sort of like fringe invaders of the close-knit group; there, but just somehow not really a part of the whole. She and her boyfriend Hoyt would often make appearances on Friday nights at Lou Pine's, or at least they had when I was still going. Not only had I given up normal outings with my friends I had also been avoiding anywhere that Eric would most likely be. I wasn't sure what it was I was avoiding exactly since we lived together and he was always around. I think in the back of my mind I liked Eric just a bit more when he was on stage and it was just a bit too painful to have to see him knowing the real Eric I lived with was a vastly different person.

"Amelia!" Jess screamed out loud and I furrowed my brow at her with a smile before looking around to see if the customers were disturbed. There was only an elderly couple and a chicly dressed young businessman sitting at the far end of the café and neither party even flinched at the high-pitched wail. Annoying as it was, it was effective because not seconds later Amelia emerged from the swinging back door of the kitchen with a hand towel in one hand and a spoon in the other.

"What? For chrissakes, Jess, how many times do I have to tell you not to yell for me? Is it too much to ask that you expend even a modicum of energy just to peek your head back and talk to me like a normal person? Sookie, oh my god, I thought you were dead and Eric was just smoking so much he couldn't smell the stench of your decomposing body!" She interrupted herself halfway through her rant to fling her arms around me and hold me tight in an embrace. I relaxed into her arms, realizing that I had missed her much more than I thought.

"I'm sorry," I said when she pulled away and added a pouty lower lip to my apology in hopes that she would take pity on me.

"As you should be. How's life?"

"Busy. Lonely. How have you been?"

"Still trying," she said getting quietly serious for a moment. She was referring to the fact that she and Tray were trying to get pregnant and had been unsuccessful thus far. I knew it was particularly painful and I felt very guilty all of a sudden for being an absent friend.

"How's Tray?"

"He's trying really hard to be strong for both of us. I know he isn't talking to anyone about it, though, so I'm a little concerned that he's just going to shut down completely once it all becomes too much."

"It'll happen for you, Ames. I know it will. You were born to be a mother." I gently rubbed Amelia's back as she tried to hold back tears. Placing a brave smile on her face she gave a short laugh through her sniffles and nodded as if she agreed. I wasn't certain she did at that moment, but who was I to force her to talk about things that were painful.

She exhaled shakily, "We have each other." She said this as if it were more for her own benefit than mine, but I nodded in agreement anyway.

"You guys are really lucky to have found one another. I feel like I'm going to be alone forever."

"Don't close yourself off to the possibility of love, Sookie."

I popped up onto the counter that I had been leaning against. Swinging my legs absentmindedly I watched as she wiped down the opposite counter and organized around the register. Jess pulled herself up onto the counter next to me and shook a near empty carafe at me as a way of asking if I wanted a cup. I shook my head and tipped my mug to show her that I still had latte left in it.

"And how are you and Hoyt?" As I asked this question her face broke into the widest grin I had ever seen. It was evident from her reaction that she was totally head over heels and my natural reaction was to feel intensely jealous. I wanted to chalk it up to young love, to not knowing any better than to be bitter about romantic relationships, but I knew that wasn't it. I was jealous because I didn't think I had ever felt true love. Infatuation, lust, those things I knew, but truthfully I had never made it far enough into a relationship to know what came after the newness wore off.

"Good," I replied with a smile and lightly nudged her with my elbow. She blushed and bit down on her lip in an effort to stop smiling, but it was useless, she was still gushing just at the thought of her boyfriend.

Suddenly I felt a sharp sting on my thigh as Amelia's hand came down with a loud 'thwack'. "Shit," I exclaimed, rubbing my thigh briskly.

"Don't be such a baby. I know what you are thinking, Susanna. Love does not just happen to you, you need to actually make an effort to leave your apartment every once and awhile and expose yourself to the outside world. No one is ever going to fall in love with you from the confines of your bedroom." I regretted telling her my full name. I should have known she would only use it against me.

"How do you know I don't leave? I don't tell you everything," I attempted weakly to make an argument for myself. Though we both knew that if I was going anywhere I only had a limited number of friends to go with and she knew them all.

"Do you forget that I talk to Pam?" Pam, of course. I decided I wasn't going to tell her anything ever again. "I only say these things because I love you and love is what it is all about. It is what every great writer has written about, what every great song has been sung about. The passion we find within ourselves is the passion that is awakened by others. If you chose to live your life putting off finding that true inspiration then you will find yourself alone at the end of your life with nothing to keep you warm but empty words."

I look over to see Jess nodding along. She made a good point, but that didn't mean that I had to accept it. I had wanted to cheekily respond that lots of people had found love over the years through internet dating. While I couldn't stastically confirm my hypothesis I could reasonably assume that a great majority of those people were at some point on their computer in their bedroom. I refrained, though, because I knew she was only saying it to try and encourage me, there was no need to be a smartass.

We spent the rest of the afternoon discussing decidedly less heavy subject matter and I headed home feeling a million pounds lighter.

"I'm not trying to make you feel bad," Amelia confessed to me as she was hugging me goodbye. "I just think you are a badass chick and I want to see you happy."

"I am happy," I answered feebly. She didn't say anything else.

Later that night I was wrapped in a blanket on the couch lazily drifting off to sleep while half watching a ridiculous sitcom that was more aggravating than entertaining. It wasn't terribly late, probably only about nine or so, but I was exhausted. Feeling a slight chill through the thin paned window next to me I pulled the blanket closer around me and heaved myself off the couch in an attempt to move to my room. Only I must have heaved a little too enthusiastically because I heaved myself right into the coffee table, tripped over my own legs and ended up sprawled on the floor. I was lying there thinking that it couldn't get any worse when I heard the door open. In the back of my mind I knew I should get up, but instead I squeezed my eyes shut and hoped that Eric would merely not notice me on his way by. I heard the distinct heavy thud of his steel-toed boots as he made his way across the hardwood floors only to have my heart catch in my throat when they abruptly stopped.

Knowing he had discovered my pathetic state I looked up reluctantly and found myself staring into his beautiful blue eyes. He had crouched down over me, his tangled hair hung in his face as he looked down at me with a smirk. At least someone was enjoying this. I fought the urge to reach up and brush away his hair opting instead to push myself up.

"What happened?"

"I was admiring the ceiling," I snapped a little too harshly. Being so near to him was wreaking havoc on my stomach; it flipped and flopped in a very nausea inducing way.

"Sorry," he said, putting his hands up in a defensive motion.

"No, I'm sorry. I just fell." He was alone. God help me, but all I could think about was how good he looked. He wore a black wool coat that was at least a size too big over a dingy t-shirt that I imagine at one point had been white, but was now more of a yellow. His hair looked as though it had been washed recently, but due to his nervous habit of running his hands through it, it was tangled and wild. My body always had such a visceral reaction to his that it was almost a comfort that someone else was always around. If we weren't alone it was so much easier to control myself. I realized that the hollow feeling in my stomach weren't just random loneliness—I had missed Eric. We had come to form some weird friendship and then sex or lack thereof, just fucked it all up. I missed how he made me laugh, and the random stupid things he said to me. I spent so much time trying not to think of Eric sexually that I had just stopped thinking of him altogether.

But standing just a bit too closely in the quiet confines of our living room was setting ablaze the feelings I had fought to control. I wouldn't kiss him. I was stronger than that.

I abruptly turned and walked into my bedroom, stopping to shut off the TV acting like I wasn't running away but rather just continuing on the path I had started on before falling on my ass. I made it into my room and was about to turn and shut the door when I saw that Eric had followed me. Unsure of what was going on I simply left the door open and laid down on my bed, my blanket still wrapped firmly around my body.

"What's up?" I asked as casually as I could possibly manage.

He pulled my worn copy of _The Hottest State_ from his back pocket. I hadn't expected that after all this time he would return it, but here he was placing it with almost reverence at the foot of my bed. Then without asking my permission he laid down next to me, completely parallel to my body not one inch of his being in contact with mine. My body hummed with the painful need to touch and be touched.

"I finished it," he offered after a brief silence. It was disconcerting the way he seemed so comfortable laying next to me, unaware of the deep anxiety it dredged up in me.

"Oh," I said cautiously, not really certain what type of reaction he was looking for. We both lay there for a few moments looking up at my ceiling. Eventually the silence was so thick I thought I might scream just to break it. Obviously he had something to say, otherwise he could just have easily left the book and gone on his way.

"What did you think?" I asked with slight trepidation. The way he was going about this was keeping me on edge and I just wished he would get on with it.

"I think you were wrong." Well what else was new?

"About?" I prompted.

"He wasn't an ass. He didn't portray her as some basket case to soften the blow of his insensitivity."

"I don't recall saying quite those words, but please, enlighten me."

"He was a young guy, inexperienced and kind of naïve who had had a bad run of things thus far with women and very few positive examples of functioning relationships growing up. He had finally found someone who fascinated him, an attractive, intelligent woman who couldn't be compartmentalized into any of his preconceived definitions of femininity."

I had the distinct urge to roll my eyes at where this was going; of course Eric sympathized with the Ethan Hawke character. But this was the most I had heard Eric say in weeks and I didn't want to stop him talking. It felt good and I didn't want to mess that up.

"Only, this kid is uncomfortable with how to deal with his feelings for the woman who only baffles him. He doesn't know who he is, isn't mature enough to enter into a meaningful adult relationship with her as evidenced by the fact that he is so consumed with the thought of having sex with her. Not to mention the fact that she holds so many cards over him, she's mature and smart, has experience and above all knowingly denies him the sex he so desperately craves even though it is clear the effect it is having on him."

"Wait, wait a minute. _You_ think he is immature because he wants to have sex with her? No offense, but coming from you that's just funny."

"No, the sex isn't why he's immature. Sex is an equalizer; no matter who we are, how different we are everyone fucks the same. By having sex with her he will be able to bring her down off a pedestal in his mind and essentially take away some of what mystifies him."

"Interesting," I say softly. Sweet Jesus, who knew?

"So anyway, she essentially uses this knowledge to manipulate him in hopes that she can force him to mature under duress. In the end they knew they weren't right for one another and they chose the best possible route, which was to acknowledge that and prevent themselves from causing each other further pain."

"While I don't necessarily agree with all of that, I'm pretty impressed. How many times did you read it?" I almost wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. I was tired, far too tired to analyze the spiel that had just been relayed to me. Perhaps when I woke up I would consider what it all meant, but right at that very moment I just wanted to sleep.

"More than once," he answered vaguely.

My eyelids were drooping and I was having trouble keeping awake. I yawned big and curled up on my side into Eric's shoulder, inhaling his scent and burrowing my head into the soft warmth of his skin.

"We can talk about it tomorrow," I think I said, but I was already half gone. I felt his chest rumble with a silent laugh and he kissed my temple.

"Goodnight," he mumbled into my ear, but I was asleep.

I awoke alone the next morning, the smell of fresh coffee yanked me from my dreams. I had been dreaming that I was a telepathic barmaid in love with an ancient vampire who loosely resembled Eric. Pam had also been a vampire, which I doubted she would be pleased with. It was all very bizarre. I rolled out of bed and pulled on a worn pair of skinny jeans and an oversized red and black plaid shirt. Gathering my hair up into a loose bun, I was still securing the elastic when I walked into the kitchen.

I stopped short at the sight before me. Tara was sitting on the counter. I was hurt, overwhelmed with an emotion I couldn't adequately express.

"Hey," she greeted me with a smile and I had to fight the sudden urge I had to throw up. I hadn't felt Eric leave my bed last night, hadn't heard him leave or return home, but there was proof sitting in my kitchen smiling at me at that hadn't just returned to his room and gone to sleep. I didn't know what to say, I was feeling disoriented. The suffocation from invisible weight pushing down on my chest drove me back into my room. I shoved my feet into the ugliest but most comfortable pair of Ugg boots, grabbed my keys, a wad of cash and my ten-dollar plastic imitation wayfarers from my beside table where I had dumped them the day before and out the door I was walking. Down the stairs, out the door, down the street I walked. I walked and I walked. I didn't know where I was going, but when my heart finally ceased the double time rhythm that it had begun beating out from the second I saw Tara I stopped and slumped over in the middle of the street. Bracing my hands against my thighs I breathed deeply in and out and tried to think clearly about where I was going.

I could have easily gone to Pam's, but something told me she wasn't there alone and the last thing I felt like doing was making this particular first impression on a man she was getting serious about. And so I continued to walk aimlessly, not thinking of anything. Moving was a means to distract myself. If I just kept going then I had a purpose. The moment I found myself on the stoop of Tray and Amelia's apartment something inside me broke. I wasn't sure if I went there on purpose or if my feet had just subconsciously carried me there, but the second I rang the doorbell I began sobbing.

I couldn't clearly see through my tears, but I knew Tray had opened the door and was silently regarding me with confusion. He didn't say a word as I lifted the sunglasses from my face and placed them on top of my head. I could only imagine how pathetic I looked standing there sobbing uncontrollably, hair askew and no makeup. He didn't miss a beat though, as he pulled me into his large, strong arms and called out for his wife in the calmest voice I had ever heard. His kindness only made me cry harder still.

"What?" Amelia said as she walked into the scene, she had a towel on her head and I immediately regretting intruding on their morning. "Oh my god, what happened? Is everything okay?" When she saw the state I was in she rushed to my side. Obviously the sight of me had sent Amelia to panic mode and I waved my hands uselessly in an attempt to convey that everything was fine. "Take your time," she said soothingly as I began choking on air while I attempted to stifle my hysterical sobs.

After a few moments I was able to get it out. "I love him."

I will never be able to erase that look of pity that washed over Amelia's face from my memory.

"Who?" She asked obligingly as if she didn't have the answer.

"Eric. I love him." And I began crying again.

* * *

Additional Author's Note: Y'all I almost peed my pants in excitement. I'm in an effin' community.  
Okay, so lots o' people have been saying that Eric is super confusing (which he is, but he is a man after all) so I hope we will slowly be unraveling the Northman mystery soon. Also, **Cutiekins**: sup? I read your review and I'm all 'oh they hook up a little and then run away from each other? well, then I won't do that this chapter'. I wrote the whole thing and then I realized that is exactly what I did yet again, lol.

Lastly, **peppermintyrose**: I have a crush on you too! *gushes and runs away*


	8. Everything We Will Never Admit

A/N: Longer author's note at the bottom. I don't own anything. Song in italics belongs to Bob Dylan.

* * *

Chapter Eight: Everything We Will Never Admit to Ourselves

"Breathe," Amelia coached me in a soothing voice as I struggled to get a hold of myself. I was embarrassed to say the very least about my minor psychotic break, that I had let my emotions get the better of me. At this point I was crying more for my pride than anything else. And Anger. I recognized the feelings I was experiencing as anger. Last night when Eric had spoken to me while lying in bed he had given me hope. Hope that he could be someone…something more than what I had thought. Seeing Tara in my kitchen this morning had ripped away all that hope I had allowed myself to feel. I was humiliated not only because of my emotional display, but for the feelings I couldn't help but feel for a guy who no sensible girl should ever feel for.

She handed me a glass of water that Tray had brought over. I took it gratefully and began sipping slowly. "I have to get ready. Will you be okay?" I nodded and kept on drinking. I was vaguely aware that Tray had taken a seat next to me, but I was mortified and couldn't even bring myself to look at him.

"What do you know about his family?"

I was slightly surprised at his question, but I cleared my throat and told him what Eric had told me about his mother's death and subsequently his stepfather's.

"I think that Appius really loved his mother. When she died he just never got over it. He never committed to anyone else, just instead choosing to abstain from women altogether. Probably in hopes that he could never get hurt again."

"That's really sad," I said without much emotion. I wasn't really sure why he was sharing this with me.

"It is really sad," he repeated, nodding his head slowly. "What is even sadder, I think, is the way that Eric was affected by it all. He grew up without any real semblance of a family. Sure, he had Appius, but not really any nurturing presence to guide him. I think it left him bitter about love in many ways and even now he doesn't want to allow himself to be vulnerable to the kind of pain he knew his mother's death caused Appius."

I stayed quiet, but what Tray was telling me was filling in a lot of holes for me. "I think a lot of people have shitty childhoods and that is not really a free pass to abdicate any emotional responsibility as an adult."

"Maybe not," he said evenly, "I'm just telling you how I see it." He wasn't being judgmental or mean; he was trying to share with me parts of Eric that I had yet to see.

"Thank you," I said sincerely.

"He hasn't let anyone in for a long time, Sookie. Just don't push him away before you even give him a chance to get a foot in the door."

"Ready to go?" Amelia called out from the door.

"Thanks again, Tray. Please don't tell anyone I had a nervous breakdown on your doorstep."

"I'm married to Amelia," he offered with a smile as a means of explanation. I didn't quite understand what he meant, but I wasn't entirely sure that I wasn't supposed to.

"You are a good man, Tray Dawson." I laughed and hugged him once more before I went to find Amelia.

"So, really? Or was this just an 'I'm gonna be forty' Sally Albright moment?" She asked as we began walking down the street. I knew in that moment that Amelia and I were going to be friends for a long time. She knew I was crazy and knew I knew I was crazy yet she still had patience with me.

"Definitely the latter," I admitted sheepishly. I looked at her through my sunglasses and saw the kind expression on her face. "You think I'm crazy don't you?" I actually felt mildly crazy, but it bruised my ego too much to say it out loud. She shook her head and offered a smile but didn't say a word as she waited patiently for me to let it out. "I don't know. Maybe I am just in love with the idea of him. Or maybe it's him, I have no clue. It's just that I want a man who isn't a complete pushover, but someone who treats me equal. You know?"

"And you think he treats you equal?" She sounded skeptical.

"Ugh, I don't know. I don't know! He's just fun and funny and smart, but I feel that just all gets canceled out by his douchbagginess. I am tired of being alone, but part of me doesn't care at all until that point oh one percent of the time when I feel like it is crashing down on me and I am going to be alone forever. And he is there all the time just being wonderful slash awful and it's confusing and I'm totally confused." I sounded pathetic. Even worse, I felt pathetic. I wasn't sure when I had turned into this sniveling creature who publicly lost control over her emotions.

"There is indeed an abundance of douchbagginess. Do you want to know what I think?"

"Yes, please."

"Forget about him. Don't pin all these hopes and dreams on someone who has already let you down before you are even out of the gate. If something happens organically, I'm not saying not to pursue it, but don't go chasing after someone who you know will disappoint you. I know we haven't known each other for a long time, Sookie, but I do know you well enough to know you are better than panting after some guy who doesn't even let his sheets cool in between women."

"You are right."

"I know I am. Go out and enjoy your life, you are young and free and successful, goddamnit. Fuck the Eric Northmans of the world and focus on making yourself happy. Love will follow naturally. Trust me."

"I'm so sorry I fell apart on your doorstep this morning."

"Everyone gets one," she joked and playfully pushed me across the sidewalk.

"Your husband gave me completely conflicting advice."

"My husband, as much as I love him, is an idiot. Come in and get some coffee while I set up."

"Yes, ma'am." I mock saluted before grabbing the door to hold it open for her.

Introspection is a strange creature. On one hand it is good to examine yourself, to look inside and really pick apart yourself and on the other it is horrible and painful. Who in their right mind would want to admit to themselves their faults in the most ugly and raw way? Precisely. So as I walked home I thought a lot about what Amelia had said to me. Was it true that I was setting my expectations so low with Eric? Ultimately I knew she was right, what I didn't need was to be setting myself up for disappointment. I wasn't sure when it was that I had developed these feelings for him, but nothing good was going to come from overanalyzing myself into hysteria. It was best if I just let them go and focused on myself for a while. By the time I reached my apartment I had convinced myself that my feelings for Eric were merely transference of my yearning for male companionship and I promised myself that I would make an effort to get out and enjoy my life regardless of my relationship status. I had in fact convinced myself so thoroughly of this that I now had a new mission. I was going to tell Eric that it was unacceptable to a. treat women the way he did and b. pawn them off on me like I was some live-in babysitter.

I walked into the apartment mentally psyching myself up to confront Eric. The talk with Amelia really worked me up to the point of having a real girl power moment. In my mind I was going into battle, I was going to let him know the score and spare him no mercy. I was woman, hear me roar.

That was right up until I stepped foot in the hallway and heard him strumming lightly something that very closely resembled a Dylan song that I hadn't heard in a long time, a song that reminded me of father and mother dancing alone in the kitchen as I watched them from a dark hallway. I very rarely though of my parents. I had been so young when they died that I had very few memories of them, but now and again I would get flashes of things I remembered and it was intensely painful. It was like a knife ripping through my stomach, opening up all the pain I never allowed myself to feel. It had been late and I was supposed to be in bed, but I hadn't been tired and I wanted a glass of water. I had snuck downstairs and when I was in the hallway I saw them dancing slowly in the kitchen as my father softly sang that song. They never knew I was there, I had crept back upstairs without them ever noticing me. I didn't really know my parents, only the things that my Gran had shared with me, but I had held tight to that image of my parents swaying in the dimly lit kitchen and I had always hoped that a man would love me the way my father loved my mother.

He was in the midst of the chorus, head thrown back, eyes closed, seemingly drowning in the emotions pouring forth with his words. Instantly I knew I had lost my nerve, my entire mood deflated so completely by my painful memories. I walked past him as unobtrusively as I could and went into the kitchen to make myself something to eat and to shake off the pain.

I was lost in completely inappropriate thoughts of Eric and I making passionate love on the kitchen table when I heard the distinct rumble of his voice in my ear, "Could you hear that?" He was playing it cool, like nothing had happened meanwhile my heart was pounding so loud I thought he might be able to hear it.

"Sookie?"

"Hmm? What?" I said, pulling myself from my internal turmoil.

"I said could you hear that?"

"Yeah, I could hear it." I wanted to yell at him, to draw a line in the sand and make him stand on one side of it. Fuck him for making me feel this way, my mind and my body were at complete odds with each other and it was driving me insane. What I was going to do was to run tape down the length of the apartment like I had seen Wally do once on Leave It To Beaver. If I could keep him at a distance maybe I could think straight long enough to say my peace and regain my dignity.

"Well?" He prompted, seemingly oblivious to my dilemma.

"It was fine. Listen, we need to have a talk."

"Okay…" he smiled as if he was unsure of what I was about to say and pulled himself up on the counter. I moved to the table with my food, it wasn't a tape line but at least it gave the illusion of separation.

"I'm not really sure how to say this. It's just that—I understand you have a personal life, Eric, and I really don't want to try and draw out some rules for you to live your life by. The fact of the matter is, though, that we share a place and it isn't exactly fair to me that you keep on leaving these strange women unattended in my house."

"No, I guess it isn't. I'm sorry. Why didn't you say anything sooner?" Of course he thought it was just so easy to apologize. Why wouldn't he think that? All Eric had to do was flash that fucking smile of his and the whole world bowed down at his feet.

"I don't know. I was okay with it and this morning when I saw Tara I just realized I wasn't okay with it anymore." My face flushed at my admission, but I had put it out there so I couldn't back down. "It's uncomfortable and just—I don't want to make a bigger deal out of it than it is. I just felt like I needed to make it clear to you that I am unhappy before it becomes a major issue."

"Of course. You don't need to explain, I completely understand. I wasn't thinking about anyone but myself. If you don't mind me asking, though, is that all this is about? Leaving women in the house?"

"What else would it be about?"

"Jealousy?"

I snorted. "What would I be jealous of?" He was such a presumptuous ass.

"I don't know."

"Well I'm not."

"Okay."

"Okay." This conversation had taken a bizarre turn and I wasn't so sure I was in control anymore. It all just seemed at bit too smooth. I had come to expect resistance between Eric and myself. It was familiar. Right, somehow. The fact that we came to an understanding without a battle threw me off balance.

"You coming to Lou's tonight?" It was Thursday. I had all but forgotten that Eric played a solo set on Thursdays. Part of me wanted to say no just to not be around him, but the other part of me knew I had to get and enjoy myself and the perfect opportunity to do just that was presenting itself.

"Bob Dylan tribute night?" I asked jokingly, referring to the song he was playing when I came in.

"Ha ha. No. Just some covers I've been working on."

"Yeah, I'm not really doing anything so I'll probably show up." I felt like I should say more, like that shouldn't be the end of it, but I didn't say anything as I watched him dismount the counter. With a grace almost unimaginable for a man of his height he heaved himself off the counter and landed with a light thud on the ceramic tile. He left the room, but seconds later I looked up to see him leaning against the doorframe looking down at the cracked floor that I constantly promised myself I would get fixed.

"I didn't sleep with her last night." It was a strange admission and I wasn't sure whether or not I believed him. I hadn't even asked.

"It's none of my business." I answered in a firm tone because it really wasn't. Also, I had absolutely no desire to think about him fucking her I had heard enough of it to last me a lifetime.

"I didn't want you to think I did was all."

"What about the rest of them?" I asked. I wasn't trying to be hurtful it was the truth. He could confess one night of abstinence all he wanted but it didn't change the reality of the situation. He didn't say anything else, just left the room quietly. I could still hear him strumming softly in his room when I went to take a shower and when I got out he was gone.

When I got to Lou's that night I went straight to the bar and took a seat. There wasn't anyone I knew there and strangely enough I was comfortable with that. I wasn't normally someone who was okay with being alone in a public place, I would have to fiddle uncomfortably with my phone or pull out the book that I usually carried in my bag, but tonight I felt brave and adventurous. Tonight I was someone who sat alone at bars without props. Jesus, I was an episode of Sex and the City. Only no sex. And in a less desirable area of the city.

Sam, the bartender, greeted me warmly as I took a seat. He was maybe more than ten years my senior, but with a definite rustic charm. His long-ish dirty blonde hair curled around his ears in a way that said he didn't care what he looked like, but he knew he looked good anyway. He was on the short side of the spectrum, but he was solid and had the most unbelievable biceps that would actually ripple as his arms reached out across the bar. All in all he was a solid eight and I wouldn't have kicked him out of my bed should he appear there magically.

"Sam." I smiled softly and leaned over the bar so we could talk.

"What can I get you?"

"Gin and Tonic, please."

"So, I haven't seen you around much lately. What's been going on?"

"Eh, work mostly. Nothing too exciting. Just needed to get out for awhile."

"And this is where you choose to go?" he asked with a smile.

He went to serve another customer and I was left alone with my thoughts. It had been a weird last couple of days and I wasn't sure whether I was experiencing some quarter life crisis or if my hormones had just mutinied throwing me into a roller coaster of emotions. Tracing endless circles with my fingers around the rim of my glass I was contemplating the copious amount of fucked up, indiscernible feelings I had for Eric and men in general. What was wrong with me? I just wanted a nice simple, safe relationship with a man who would treat me nicely and then somewhere else, somewhere deeper and darker and even further back in my mind I relished the topsy-turvy feelings that Eric evoked in me. But then again he was such an asshole. They always are.

"Ah, Mrs. Dawson, a pleasure." I spun around in my seat at the sound of Sam's words to see Amelia smiling broadly at me.

"Sook, when I said get out I meant out. Hey Sam, martini please?"

"I know, I know," I said rolling my eyes. "Baby steps."

She gave me a look that said 'I think you are pussing out, but I'm going to let it slide this time'. In turn I said nothing, but smiled innocently and flirted shamelessly with Sam much to her pleasure. When Eric finally took the stage I saw Alcide approach from the corner of my eye. He hugged me quickly and signaled for Sam to get him a beer.

"He says he does it to explore his creativity," he said out of nowhere. I knew he was referring to Eric but I played dumb. "He really does it to stroke his ego. And obviously to score with insanely attractive women such as yourself."

"In his dreams," I told him and wrapped my arms firmly around his bicep. "You on the other hand." I was teasing and then again not so much, but he knew it and played right along with me.

"I knew I was more beautiful. I am always telling him that chicks dig the fuckin tats and he's all no way it's the hair. I can't wait to prove him wrong." At the last part he snaked his arm around my waist and pulled me to him dramatically. I laughed loudly without any regard to who may have been watching and playfully slapped at his hand as it faked at touching places that I might not all together have been opposed to having him touch.

A jarring screech of feedback drew our attentions to the stage. "This is for you," Eric said mysteriously into the mic and began strumming out the chords to the song he had been playing in the living room that morning with more vigor than the song required.

"_I don't mean trouble please don't put me down or get upset. I am not pleading  
or saying I can't forget you. I do not pace the floor bowed down and bent but yet,  
mama you been on my mind,_" he sang staring through my eyes deep into my soul from across the room. My entire body tensed with the emotion behind those words and I wanted to run to him and confess all my feelings. But I did just the opposite. I tore my attention away from him and began talking to Alcide about something that I wasn't focused on. The purpose of the conversation was to forget that every single nerve in my body wanted to be in Eric's arms. Common sense kept my body firmly where it was carrying on a conversation that I couldn't repeat a word of if my life depended on it.

"_I'm not askin' you to say words like yes or no. Please, understand me. I have no place I'm callin' you to go. I'm just whispering to myself so I can't pretend that I don't know. Mama, you been on my mind._" He continued to howl on stage, in the achingly familiar stance, gripping his guitar and baring his soul through someone else's words and it was all I could do not to weep with the visceral reaction I was having to hearing him say those things. It was not like it was in the living room, something I could quietly walk past and ignore, it was amplified on stage for all to hear, out in the open and electrified. Alcide was seemingly oblivious to what was going on between Eric and myself and I did my best not to alert him to it. I laughed and smiled at the appropriate intervals and probably looked for all the world as if I was just a carefree woman enjoying the company of a man, but my stomach was twisting in knots knowing the one thing I wanted in that moment was the one thing I could never have.

While my mind was elsewhere the set ended with a smattering of applause. Amelia had long since disappeared, leaving Alcide and I alone at the bar. We were engaged in a conversation about the integrity of musicians in mainstream music when Eric approached us. He loudly cleared his throat and practically tore Alcide away without so much as an excuse me. They stalked off into a far corner out of earshot and  
I watched while they gesticulated wildly, yelling words that I couldn't make out in the dim light of the bar. I waited for about ten minutes, but I was getting tired so I decided it was time to head out, whatever was going on between them was clearly not going to be resolved any time soon and I didn't have the balls, quite frankly, to approach them and say goodbye so I gave a quick wave to Alcide and when he mouthed 'Can I call you?' very clearly across the room Eric turned to look at me incredulously. To say I was taken back by the look in Eric's eyes would be an understatement. Suddenly feeling trapped and unsure of what was going on I nodded slowly in response to Alcide. Eric's face was a cold mask and I briefly thought about going to talk to him, but thought better of it and left without looking back again.

I was on the couch, my legs tucked up underneath me, a blanket wrapped around me so that just my head poked out. I was tired, exhausted even, but I couldn't sleep. I thought a little television would my mind down enough to let me sleep so I popped a bottle of wine and settled down to revisit my youth. Shortly through the opening credits I heard Eric come in and felt the couch bow under his weight when he collapsed beside me.

"All alone?" I cringed at the sound of my own harsh words.

Instead of responding though he asked while staring straight ahead, "Is this My So-Called life?"

He didn't mention the incident with Alcide so instead of stirring up shit I merely smiled and turned the volume up in order to hear Claire Danes voice over about her teenage angst. The tension was palpable, but neither of us said a word. I couldn't tell if it was better not to talk but it felt easier to ignore it. The longer the episode went on the closer we got until my head was on a pillow in his lap and his arm was wrapped around my shoulders. It almost wasn't sexual. Almost. We were two lonely people seeking comfort to make it through the night.

"So," he started dramatically half way through the second episode, "Would you say you were more of an Angela or a Rayanne?" His mood was light, and though we had sat the past hour in relative uncertain silence I decided to go with it. In the particular scene we were watching, good girl turned pseudo rebel Angela Chase was being coerced by her new bestie Rayanne to go out and personally retrieve her brand new fake id from the luscious Jordan Catalano. I distinctly remembered watching this show when I was younger feeling like there were other people in the world who truly understood my pain. I was ten.

"Pretty intense for a ten year old, weren't you?" I hadn't realized that I had said that all out loud. I blushed and sipped my wine, hemming and hawing over whether or not I should still answer the question. "So?" He prompted, making my mind up for me.

"I would have to say neither. I was more like a Brian." Brian Krakow was Angela's awkward neighbor slash childhood friend who didn't quite fit into her new cool social circle. "I just watched high school, mostly from a distance. And you? Who were you? Oh no! No, no wait!" I flung my arms out in a halting motion and planted myself practically in his lap. "Let me guess." He laughed and I laughed with him, caught up in the heady sensations the nearness of his body was causing me. It felt good. "You were totally Jordan Catalano. Oh so brooding and too cool for school. I bet the girls just melted when you leaned intensely against the nearest surface. I'm right I know I am you don't even need to confirm it."

Eric frowned and grumbled, "He had negative qualities too." His defensive reaction only caused me to further howl with laughter as I attempted to hold his considerable frame down with what little strength I could gather. "Oh, shut up," he said as I began hyperventilating, but a smile was beginning to crack at the edges of his mouth and he allowed me to remain in his lap. "Yeah, yeah you think you are so funny."

"I am," I gasped out as my laughter died down. "And clearly," I fingered the collar of his blue lumberjack plaid shirt, "you never let go of the nineties."

"Oh, whoa, wait just a second there. Don't think I didn't see your shirt this morning, that was as plaid as the day was long."

"It's making a come back."

"Sure."

"Shut up."

"You started it."

"Shut up."

I woke alone on the couch the next morning. The apartment was unseasonable cold and the second my feet touched the hardwood floor I yelled out in surprise. "Sweet Jesus!" Digging my slippers out from under the couch, I padded into the kitchen to find Eric leaning against the sink smoking and staring into space.

"Eric," I chided as I pulled the cigarette from in between his fingers and crushing it on the plate he was using as an ashtray.

"What?" he asked as though he genuinely had no idea what was wrong.

"Please don't smoke in here. It is disgusting." His mood was solemn and it felt as though our night together had never happened. I wanted to say something, to say it out loud in order to make sure that it was real, but I didn't. I poured myself a cup of coffee and stared down into the muddy liquid trying to figure out what had happened in between last night and this morning to create this hollow feeling between us.

"You think I'm disgusting?"

"I think that smoking is disgusting." Suddenly I was in his arms and he was kissing me desperately, his hands gripping my shirt pulling me closer still. His tongue swiped across my lips and the vague taste of smoke and coffee assaulted me. I pushed hard against his chest with the palms of my hands, twisting my head away from him and struggling against his hold.

"Eric, stop. Stop it."

"Sookie, I want you. I want you, why can't you see that?"

"Are you fucking joking? What is this, like the first night you don't sleep with someone and all of a sudden you can't live without me? Give me a break."

Something in those words obviously hurt him because he immediately pulled away and stared angrily at me as he pulled another cigarette from his pack and lit it as if in defiance. I rolled my eyes at his childish actions and took a sip of my coffee.

"Don't go out with him." I laughed bitterly and immediately turned and left the room. I should have seen it coming. The song, the fucking argument, all the signs were there and for whatever reason I just hadn't seen it.

When I reached the door I spun back around and angrily pointed my finger at him. "You are supposed to be my friend."

He looked wounded and slightly repentant, but still angry. "I am your friend."

"Then fucking act like it," I spat. I stormed to my room and slammed the door behind me.

* * *

Author's Note: Hey, there. Long time no see. I have a long list of explanations as to why I haven't written in so long, but they mostly boil down to lack of inspiration and the fact that I am in the middle of planning my wedding so my life is way hectic at the moment. I do want to apologize for not answering your reviews of the last chapter. There was such a long period in between me posting and getting around to read them I wasn't sure that any of you would still care about a response (lol) so I just didn't, but I really appreciated the input and I was thrilled that I actually made a couple of you hate Eric. I do want to say that I don't think I've had Eric do anything in this story that he hasn't done in the books. Eric and Sookie are not dating and so I don't feel like he is being unfaithful. Insensitive, maybe, but not exactly the big jackass some of you seemed to think he was being. Also, I kind of want to defend my Sookie. I know some of you think she is some sort of insecure doormat, but I just don't see her that way. I think she is a young woman in her twenties who still is maybe unsure of who she is, I don't think that this makes her weak or an idiot as one reader put it. I really think in order for there to be genuine angst there have to be faults and these are just some of their faults. Anyway, you are all more than welcome to your opinions and honestly I think it's really flattering that I inspired such intense responses from some of you. Side note: **rprufio** pointed out that I forgot to credit the Yeah Yeah Yeahs for the title of chapter seven. Lastly, I am hurrying this update along, but if you want to comment on anything I promise promise promise I will respond to your review.

**Weird and totally unnecessary for you to read**: I know some people have pointed out my dumb references that make no sense to anyone but me. Off the top of my head some of them are:

1. The Hottest State is a book that was written in I think 1998 by actor Ethan Hawke. I love this book and while I draw parallels between the relationship between Eric and Sookie with the relationship between the characters of the book there is absolutely no need for you to know what the book is about to understand anything else. I also somewhat reference the movie Reality Bites which stars Ethan Hawke from time to time, you should watch it, but you don't need to.

2. When Harry Met Sally. A movie staring Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan—aka the best movie ever. I referenced Harry without actually ever naming this movie and in this chapter I reference it again when Amelia asks Sookie if she was having a 'Sally Albright' moment. In the scene Meg Ryan who plays Sally is upset because she finds out that the man whom she dated for many years is getting married and the reason they broke up was because he didn't want to get married. She breaks down while telling Harry, her best platonic friend, "I'm going to be forty!" He responds, "In eight years." The reason that I referenced this is because she is having a meltdown supposedly about one thing, but it really stems far beyond that into issues she doesn't want to necessarily own up to much like Sookie.

3. My So-Called Life is a television show that aired for one season in '94. I love the nineties, can you tell? I think it defined my generation and since Sookie is a part of that generation I may have transferred a few of personal views onto her character and for that I apologize, but I was too sentimental to take it out. Plus I thought it was a nice interlude where Sookie and Eric were allowed to interact without really talking in a personal context as they so often do in this story.


	9. Keep It To Yourself, For Me

Author's Note: Drum roll, please. For the first time ever I have been beta'd. Introducing the lovely **krtmd. **Go read her one-shot _Cock Tease_ (dirty) and give her some love.

Disclaimer: I own nothing. The title of this chapter is from _Keep It_ a particularly pertinent song for this chapter by the lovely Cheyenne Marie Mize.

I had a decision to make and I have made it, because I am about to put some of The Avett Brothers' words into Eric's mouth in a big way. For all intents and purposes any and all songs that are "written" by Eric in this story belong to The Avett Brothers. Where as people like Bob Dylan and Jeff Buckley were allowed to exist in this world it wouldn't work if the Avetts lived, so they don't. The song used in this chapter is "Pretty Girl from Chile". Do you not know who The Avett Brothers are? Well, go to youtube and search for "Scott Avett sings, 'famous flower of manhattan'" and there you will find what I think of when Eric sings in this story. His beard is super sexy and it's only better in person. Swoon.

* * *

Chapter Nine: Keep It to Yourself, For Me

I laid down on my bed, pushing my weight into the mattress, trying with what might I possessed to feel the force of my body through the springs pushing back at me. The air merely shifted around me and the disappointment rose up in my throat like bile. I couldn't even assert myself over an inanimate object.

I stared up at the ceiling for a few moments, my anger quickly dissipating. I felt tired of having the same fight over and over. One step forward always meant so many more steps back. I replayed the conversation with Eric over in my head. I always had the best arguments after the fact. In my head, when I controlled both sides of the situation, I had the most lucid arguments. In real life, once my mind is clouded with emotion, even the most basic of sentences fall apart at my mouth. But in my mind. Oh, in my mind I am a master wordsmith. But it's always after the fact, and in my head, which only adds to my frustration.

The door to the apartment opened and closed. I held my breath, waiting to hear a sound, and when I was certain that I was alone, I left the confines of my room to get more coffee and take a shower.

I was still in the bathroom, bent over at the waist with my hair brushing against the floor as I tried to maneuver the blow dryer around the mass in an attempt at making it somewhat dry, when there was a hesitant knock on the door. Softly at first, and then forceful to the point where I was briefly afraid the wood might give out. I righted myself and turned to see the door was open. He was standing there looking so uncertain.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be." My voice sounded bored, even to me. I wasn't interested in how sorry he was. They were just words like a line he recited at all the appropriate intervals. He didn't mean them, and so I didn't want to hear them.

"I am," he insisted.

"You aren't. Not really. You're sorry that you made me upset maybe, but being sorry—really being sorry means that you acknowledge what you did to make me upset in the first place. So, if you aren't going to truly be sorry, Eric, then don't bother. I would rather you just not say anything at all then make disingenuous declarations for the sake of it."

He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, leaning slightly against the doorjamb, looking down at his bare feet. I wasn't accustomed to seeing Eric without his clunky boots and it was strange to see him with nothing on his feet at all. That was the way he was: completely guarded or laid out bare for all the world to see. He was black or white; no gray areas in between to soften the blow.

"Do you still want my 'I'm-sorry-offerings'?" I couldn't help the smile that slowly took over my face at this. He was such a child. Despite his sexual indiscretions, he still managed to retain some sort of innocence from time to time, and when he wasn't being so infuriating, it was almost endearing.

"Depends. What did you get me?"

"Murray's Bagels. Do you want them?"

"I guess if you already went through all the trouble of going and getting them, why let them go to waste." He nodded once and turned. I followed him into the kitchen where the bagels were sitting next to a giant cup of coffee that I knew was intended for me, since Eric already had one in his hand. I felt my heart soften a little; after all, he had gone out of his way to try and make amends. Granted, it was through food; but honestly, with Eric, this was a giant leap in the right direction toward selflessness.

"You made coffee, and then bought more? I almost believe that you really are sorry." He didn't respond, but lifted his eyebrow, as if to say 'see?' I took my bagel from the bag and bit into it without bothering to find a plate. Eric, on the other hand, was sitting in his usual spot on the counter, taking each bite over a plate, as if he had calculated the trajectory of the crumbs from his mouth to the floor and was catching them each in the most mathematically efficient way. For such a normally haphazard giant of a man, he was peculiarly cautious about the most random things. For instance, I had seen Eric brush his teeth on a handful of occasions, and every time was like I was witnessing some perfectly choreographed routine. I had never seen someone brush their teeth with such attention to each and every surface, including their gums and tongue. I wasn't entirely certain about the cleanliness of the clothes Eric wore most of the time, since I had never seen him do laundry, or even leave the house with the intention of doing laundry, but I knew without a doubt that Eric Northman had exquisite oral hygiene.

When I finished my food I thanked him and headed back to my room to do some work. I left Eric still on the counter to do whatever it was that he did during the day. Most days he left, to God knows where, and didn't return until the early hours of the evening. I suppose I could have just asked where he went, but part of me thought it best I didn't know.

It was past noon and I had buried myself in my bed, up to my neck in the blankets, with my laptop resting on my chest. I should have been working, but I couldn't think of a single word, and the constant flicker of the cursor on the screen was slowly driving me out of my mind. The rhythmic blinking was like a metronome, forcing out all coherent thought as it kept time with deafening silence. Mocking me with its constancy.

Finally, after I don't know how much time had passed, I left my room. My stomach was speaking to me, telling me things that were unpleasant and distracting. I reasoned with myself that if I were truly going to get some work done, the best possible idea would be to get up and assuage my tummy. I walked into the living room to find Eric, his boots propped up on my coffee table, dragging scuffmarks every which way across its surface. In his lap was his guitar, and on his knee a notebook. Strewn all around him on every close surface were loose sheets of paper in various stages; some sheets were filled with words scribbled out in great tangled swirls, some were crumpled, and still more were ripped in perfect little squares, the words on them indecipherable from the long black slashes that covered the pages. It looked as though an extremely isolated tornado had stormed through my living room, dumping Eric Northman on my couch amidst the wreckage.

A pen hung from his slightly parted mouth as he stared as the guitar on his lap as though he were confused it. I was almost tempted to say something, but decided against it. I opened the fridge and hung on the door for a few moments, staring blankly at the mostly empty shelves. My mind was wandering to Eric, and how long we could continue this awkward, sidestepping silence. Conceding to myself that there was nothing in the entire apartment to eat, I reluctantly shut the door of the refrigerator and looked around the kitchen.

I hated this feeling. It was like the harder we tried, the larger the gap between us seemed to become. All our efforts were merely fueling the fire, and the disheartening weight of that futility hung heavy on my shoulders. I made up my mind that I would talk to him. We could be friends. We were supposed to be friends, and I did want to be friends. For whatever reason, I felt a strong connection with him; like he and I shared parts that the rest of the world could not understand. Perhaps it would be difficult, but something told me that it would be worth it. It was just for the sake of our friendship. Friends are important, I told myself.

I took two clementines from the wooden bowl on the counter, a gift from my Gran when I had moved up north, and went back to the living room. He had not moved, his pen still dangling, as though at any moment it might tumble from his lips. I shifted some of the loose papers from the couch to make room for myself next to him and then sat down in a half-lotus style, trying hard not to disturb his arrangement.

I put one clementine down on the coffee table and held the other in my lap, as I thought about what to say. Turning the small fruit round and round in my palm, I watched as he held the guitar as if he were playing, but he refrained from touching any of the strings. It was as though he was miming, but after every few motions he would pause and write down something that was too far away for me to read. I had seen Eric play before, but I had never seen him write. In the back of my mind I knew he was an artist, but seeing him this way was like yet another side of Eric Northman was revealed to me.

"Do you know who M.F.K. Fisher is?" I asked quietly. He looked up at me then, eyebrows raised and furrowed at the same time. I waited for him to finally answer; there was no point in continuing if he didn't want to talk.

"No," he said at last, still looking at me like I had suddenly grown a new head. He pulled the pen from between his teeth and began playing with the cap—pulling it off, putting it on, repeat. It was making me a little nervous.

"I liked to read when I was younger. A lot. I would read anything—newspapers, magazines, the backs of cereal boxes. If it had words, I was gonna read it." He continued to stare at me, but his features had eased. The soft blue of his eyes startled me; I couldn't recall if I had ever noticed just how blue they were. I looked down to the clementine I was cradling in my hand and pierced my thumbnail through the skin at the top where the stem belonged with practiced precision. I carefully dragged my nail out in a circle as my other hand rotated the fruit.

"My Gran kept all these random books on her bookshelf in the kitchen. She liked history books, Civil war, that kind of stuff. But she had a bizarre habit of keeping any book that was given to her, even if she was never going to read it." I popped the circle that I had just created out of the peel like a puzzle piece and placed it, inside up, on his badly flattened pack of Marlboros. Then I flipped the orange over and began repeating the same motion on the other side. "I read all the books, of course, but there was one in particular that I read over and over again."

"M.F.K. Fisher," he said. I looked up at him and smiled to show my appreciation, pleased that he was humoring my story and me.

"She was a food writer. She wrote essays about the historical significance of food; personal essays about food. Sometimes she included recipes, but mostly it was about the feelings that food and the act of eating evoke in us. There was this one essay that has always stayed with me." I finished the other side, popped it out just as before and placed it along side the other on his cigarettes. "She wrote about the indulgences people allow themselves, like chocolate. But for her it wasn't chocolate. She indulged in tangerines." I placed my thumb near my first incision and once again pressed my nail through the skin, pulling the orange away as I sliced down the side making sure I was going all the way through.

"She describes the way she would eat tangerines, peeling them slowly and then leaving them for hours, once her husband came home, on their radiator. When he left again, she would pick up the paper she had left it on, open the window and place it in the snow." I gently tore back the edges of the peel like I was removing the clementine's jacket. I moved slowly to make sure that I didn't tear it, letting it fold inside out as I pulled it away. When it was free, I laid it too on the cigarette pack on its side, letting it once again close to form the shape of the orange.

"The way she described eating this fruit was as though it were a religious experience. No one I had ever known looked at an orange and saw anything other than an orange, let alone an almost tender moment of desire and indulgence. I knew the first time that I read that I wanted to be a writer. I thought that if someone could make something as seemingly inconsequential as a tangerine seem holy, then imagine what I could do."

Piece by piece, I gingerly pried the white veins from the flesh, cautious not to crush it in my hands, placing each strand inside the discarded shell of peel. "I have never eaten an orange the way she describes, but every time I eat an orange, I think of her words and how sometimes the smallest thing can leave such a huge impression." I met his eyes once more, but neither of us said a word. I gathered my discarded parts and stood up, unfolding my legs and stretching up with my orange in one hand and the peel in the other. I walked back to my room, leaving the other clemetine on the table where I had placed it, and closed my door behind me, temporarily putting space between us.

I wanted him to know, just as I knew, that we were more alike than we thought. I thought that if I shared some small, but important, part of myself with him that it would create a magical shift in the air, but as I sat down on my bed and pried apart the sections of orange I felt strikingly more alone than I had before.

It seemed that every single song in my itunes library was speaking to me. I knew that nothing good would ever come of that. Suddenly I was Rob Gordon, speaking to the camera about which came first, the music or the misery? Did I listen to music because I was miserable, or was I miserable because I listened to the music? Well, Nick Hornby never answered that question, but it felt like the latter. Lissie was wailing into my headphones, depressing the hell out of me, telling me to ask her why she felt so low when the vibrations of my phone on my leg almost caused me to scream out loud in surprise. I laughed at myself, pulled the headphones from my ears and answered it.

"Hello?"

"Don't you look at your caller id?"

"Ah, well, yes, Pamela. I do in fact look at my caller id. Why?"

"Then why do you say hello like that?"

"Like what?" This was a typical Pam phone conversation. She always started somewhere in the middle, as if you were already supposed to know what she was calling about.

"Like you don't know who it is."

"I didn't answer it like that."

"You most certainly did. You said 'Hello?' By raising your voice at the end of the word, it becomes a question. It wasn't a greeting. You were asking me who was calling."

"Oh my god." She could be so exasperating at times. "I am so sorry. I will never, ever answer my phone like that ever again. What can I do you for?"

"Tell me you are not doing anything tonight."

"I am not doing anything tonight." Even if I had had plans, there was only one correct answer to that. The best part about being friends with Pam was that we could go forever without talking, and yet the second one of us needed something, the other was always there without question. While my romantic ventures had proved wholly unsuccessful, a lot could be said about my luck with friends.

"Good. Girls night tonight. You and Amelia can meet me at my place at eight. Wear something nice, Sookie. God help me if I have to re-dress you when you get to my house."

"Okay, a. did Amelia agree to this? And b. for Christ's sake Pam when have you ever had to re-dress me? Did it ever occur to you that I am not trying to attract a man every time I leave my house?"

"And why not, Sook? Maybe that is why you haven't gotten laid in—oh, how many months has it been now?"

"None of your business." Actually, she probably knew down to the day the last time I had gotten laid. I mostly just didn't want to have this particular conversation when the last man I had even come close to having sex with was sitting in the next room.

"See what I mean? Admitting you have a problem is the first step."

"Oh good God. I don't even know what to say to you anymore."

"You love me and you will see me tonight."

"Yes, I love you. Are you filling in Amelia, or am I just supposed to kidnap her from her home?"

"She'll meet you. I love you too. Bye."

"Bye."

…

Alcide's extremely warm hands were trailing up my sides, brushing against my skin in the most excruciatingly slow way. I could feel his breath on the hollow of my neck, laying open-mouthed kisses along my collarbone. His hand found my cheek, and the rough pads of his fingertips traced my face down to my lips. I idly thought that he smelled like citrus and cigarettes. I didn't think that Alcide was a smoker. It was when I arched against him that I discovered there was no one there. Well, there was, but it was not Alcide. I peeked through one eye and there was Eric perched on the side of my bed, fingertips on my cheek.

"What are you doing?" I mumbled, my mouth thick with sleep.

"What were you doing?" He smirked at me and raised that fucking eyebrow. I could have been purring in my sleep for all I knew. It had been a long time, far too long, and even imaginary Alcide was enough to get me going. Pam was right. I needed to get laid. I didn't answer him, and before I could sit up he had his guitar in his lap. "Will you listen to something?"

"Uh, okay?" I was hesitant to agree, but it wasn't exactly like I could say no. He held his guitar in his hands and bent one leg up near my thigh to rest it on. The nearness of his body and my currently aroused state were a horrible combination, and I struggled to focus on anything but how wonderful his fingers had felt.

He held his hands poised just above the strings. Slowly he strummed, just one string and then another in quick succession. A stutter. Almost as though he were unsure of what he was about to do, but then he committed fully and began strumming with deliberate force.

It was the sound of his voice, as it broke loose of his body that hypnotized me. Every time he sang it was as though some other force possessed his body and brought forth a sound that seemed as though it couldn't possibly belong to him. I was never a particularly religious person, a Baptist more out of duty than conviction, but when Eric sang, I truly believed it was the closest I had ever come to a religious experience.

_I'm no more than a friend, girl_

_I can see that you need more_

_My boots are on my feet now_

_My bags are by the door_

_The love and the attention_

_That you need and ask me for _

_Are weakened by my actions_

_And the lies that I have told_

_And my heart is like a mason's _

_Hands of weathered skin_

_Each scar makes it harder for me to hurt again_

_I'd like to say_

_I'm a faithful man _

_But it may not be true_

He continued to play in earnest, nodding along to something that I couldn't hear. He looked so much like he had that first time I had seen him play, pained by the words and the notes that his body produced, as if it were all just some byproduct of his heartache. The last note sounded and he looked at me square in the eyes. I held my breath, unsure of what to do next.

He was watching me expectantly and I knew what I should say. I knew that we should just lay it all out there, and be honest, with ourselves and one another. It was the perfect opportunity to say all the things that we never could. But my problem was that I buried my feelings deep inside. And Eric's problem was that he denied he had any feelings at all. And it just wasn't in our natures to bend. So we sat there, the moment pregnant with our combined emotional unrest, and said nothing.

"Please tell me what you are thinking." The pleading in his voice tugged at my gut, but I had nothing to give him. I reached up to pinch the bridge of my nose. I was tired. Tired of all the circles we were always talking in. Tired of the endless conversations that I had with Eric in my head, only for them to never be said out loud. I was just tired. We never seemed to get anywhere, and no matter what kind of progress we seemed to make, it was all for naught.

"This is so…" I fumbled for the right words. "Suffocating, Eric. I just can't do this. All this subtext and allusion. I need uncomplicated and considerate, and I just don't think that you confessing these things to me is helpful. I mean, what? Do you mean it? If you do, then why tell me? If you can't give me anything, then why rub it in my face? I can't take it anymore. Shit! We can't change what has happened, but we can move past it, right? Right. So just fucking don't write songs about me."

"That isn't what I meant." His voice was calm. I appreciated that, the soothing quality of his voice, because with each thought that popped into my head and left my mouth, I was growing more and more hysterical. "You deserve someone nice and uncomplicated. I just want you to know that I care about you enough to want that for you. I know that I'm not anyone's ideal, but I—I care," he finished lamely. I suddenly hated that word.

"Good. You _care_. Thank you for caring."

"Don't be like that."

"Like what? Like someone who doesn't want to hear 'Oh, whoopsies! I can't help but sleep with every woman who crosses my path, even though there are obviously some unresolved feelings between us. So, rather than being an adult and attempting to rectify the situation I'm just gonna write songs about how much I suck. But honestly, I care'? Like that?" He sighed. "I'm going to go get ready. I just agreed under duress to a girls night with Pam and Amelia. And it's getting late." I untangled myself from the blankets and climbed down off the bed, awkwardly trying to balance on the mattress. I was halfway to the door when his hand caught mine and he pulled me towards him.

"Sookie." Again, he spoke softly, calmly. I looked into his eyes and my stomach flipped. I hated that he could have that affect on me and wondered what the fuck was so wrong with us that we couldn't function like normal people.

"What?" It all welled up inside of me at once, a burning pressure in my ribs that made my lungs feel like they might explode if I took even one more breath. "You can't do shit like that, Eric."

"I am trying so hard here, Sookie." His stood with his hand outstretched over his abdomen, as if he was locating a pain. Right then I wanted to be anywhere else. With anyone else. I didn't want to listen to him make more excuses for himself. "I don't always know how to talk to you and I wanted to say I'm sorry. I just wanted you to know I was sorry."

Just then the buzzer sounded, and we both looked towards the door. He let my hand drop from his grasp and went to answer it. Within moments, Dave was bounding into our apartment with Alcide trailing behind. Immediately, I was in his arms and he was swinging me around the cramped space making me terrified he was going to break my legs by slamming them into a wall.

"Oh, Sookie Stackhouse, my love! How I have missed you."

"Dave, wonderful as always. May I please be on the ground now?"

"You women, always wanting to walk. You really are such silly creatures."

"You are so weird, Dave."

"I am going to take that as a compliment."

"Take away. Hey, Alcide." I waved shyly over Dave's shoulder, and he broke into the most wonderful grin. "I'm going to get ready, I'll see you guys in a bit." Dave made a motion like he was going to smack my ass as I turned, but I pushed his arm away before he got the chance.

"I wasn't going to do anything, I swear. Scout's honor." He held up two fingers, and then unsure if he was doing it right, he put up a third. Then he thought better of it and put it down again. Clearly Dave had never been a scout.

"You had it right the first time," I said over my shoulder as I went into the bathroom and closed the door behind me. Not a half hour later, the sound of girlish screams drove me back out to investigate.

"What is going on? Oh my god, what are you doing?" Alcide was sitting on the couch holding Amelia in his lap with a giant bear hug, as Dave was creeping towards her comically with his hands outstretched as though he were going to claw her. Eric was nowhere in sight.

"Sookie! Thank god!" Amelia struggled against Alcide's hold, which only caused him to tighten his arms around her. I saw him trying to stifle his laughter behind her head, as the look on her face flickered between distressed and highly amused. She half laughed, as though she were holding it in, and wiggled her fingers at me underneath Alcide's large arms. "They are trying to tickle me. I don't know what Tray told them, but apparently they are supposed to be testing a theory. Please save me."

As I stared at the pandemonium that was my living room, Eric strolled in from the kitchen with a mouth full of food and half a sandwich in his hand. He stood there and observed with me, and once he had swallowed his food he explained. "Tray told them she was coming over here. They have been lying in wait."

"What are they testing out?" I was curious as to whether or not normal people had friends this crazy. As I looked at these people who until fairly recently I had not even know had existed, I felt a deep, crazy love for them all. They thought nothing of coming into my home and making it their own, wreaking havoc wherever they went and I loved them for it. I felt nice to not be an observer any longer, but part of the lunacy.

"I'm not at liberty to say." Boys.

"Would you please make them stop?"

"Guys," was all he said, and suddenly Dave stopped approaching Amelia and Alcide released his hold.

"I love you, I knew you would keep me safe." Amelia said, as she threw herself into my arms overdramatically. She threw up her hand to her forehead and pretended to swoon at Eric next to me. "My hero." We all burst out laughing, and I pulled Amelia back to the bathroom with me before something else happened.

"Hair up or down?" I asked, turning to her with my hair in a bunch at the back of my head that I released immediately to demonstrate the difference between the two. She was sitting on the closed toilet seat, making bath tissue origami with incredible concentration.

"Can I braid it?" I doubted Amelia's hair braiding skills a bit, but I shrugged my shoulders and figured why the hell not. She got up from her perch on the toilet and motioned for me to take her seat. Her fingers dragged my hair back from my face and played around in it for a few moments before she leaned down next to my ear and whispered, "I think I made Alcide hard wiggling around like that." I choked back a laugh at her admission, and I could tell she was trying not to laugh herself by the way she kept biting back her smile. "It was big." At that she let loose and had to pull away because she couldn't stop from laughing long and loud, letting her voice ring out against the tiled walls.

* * *

Author's Note part deux: I have re-read this chapter so much more so than previous chapters to the point where I am not even sure how I feel about it anymore. What I can say is that the next chapter will be decidedly more fun.

Some of you liked the references and some didn't need them. Just a few this time around:

1. Rob Gordon/Nick Hornby: Nick Hornby wrote quite arguably the best book _ever _called "High Fidelity" and he's just the shit in general, really you should just read everything he has ever written. His book was made into a slightly altered/Americanized movie by the same name staring John Cusack. That is whom I was referencing, but if you only chose one read the book.

2. Lissie: A wonderful singer/songwriter from Rock Island, IL. She has an incredibly voice, her music can be found on itunes. I suggest "Old Mississippi" or "Everywhere I Go" (which is the song Sookie is listening to).

3. M.F.K. Fisher: just who Sookie described her as. If you have any interest in food and even if you don't, she is just an exquisite writer.


	10. The Law of Inertia

**Disclaimer:** I don't own it.

Thanks to my beta **krtmd**. She is absolutely the only reason that any of you will know who is saying what in this monster. I rewrote lots and lots after she returned it to me, though, so any and all mistakes you find are mine.

* * *

Chapter Ten: The Law of Inertia

I let us into Pam's apartment and we were greeted with the sight of a rather frenetic Pam on the phone talking quietly but expressively, as her hands shot out in all directions, as though the person on the other end of the line would have had any idea the gesticulations that accompanied her words.

"Hey?" I asked tentatively as I shut the door behind Amelia, and we both stood there uncertainly.

"I've gotta go," Pam said into the phone, the smile on her face belying the tone in her voice. "Hey," she said to us when she tossed her phone onto the coffee table. "Sorry about that. I see you dressed appropriately, good job."

"Thanks," I said, rolling my eyes deeply into the back of my head so she could grasp the full scope of my sarcasm. "So, what are we doing?"

Pam, in a very uncharacteristic move, allowed us to choose the restaurant. She had voted for this ridiculously trendy and highly unaffordable place, obviously. I suggested a quiet bistro in Brooklyn that I always intended to go to, but often forgot about when the opportunity arose. They both shot me a look that I should just keep the rest of my suggestions to myself. Amelia insisted on a small BYOB place that was impossible to get into; I knew this for a fact because I had just read an article about the four month waiting list. She swore up and down she could get us in with her "industry" connections.

"What industry?" Pam snorted. It was a little on the mean side, but I had been thinking the same thing, so I was a little grateful, for once, that Pam couldn't keep her mouth shut.

"Just you watch," she told us menacingly, pointing her phone into Pam's face for emphasis before leaving the room to assumedly make a phone call.

Lo and behold, not two hours later we were crammed into the place, which more closely resembled a giant kitchen than a restaurant, with stainless-steel tables and a range in the center of the room. We had each bought a bottle of wine on the way in, and since we weren't allowed to take any of it home with us, had decided, somewhat unwisely, to drink them all. With the aid of the close quarters and copious amounts of alcohol, our small group soon expanded to the entire restaurant; Amelia was the life of the party, and even had the notoriously grumpy chef cracking a smile every now and then.

"You guys, this is Claudine and her husband Claude. They are from Connecticut," Amelia said, introducing us to the couple sitting next to us. Amelia pronounced Connecticut peculiarly like Connect-e-cut. I was a little baffled as to why she said it this way until I politely asked Claudine which part she was from and she repeated it back to me in the same odd way. I smiled nicely while choking down my appetizer, and tried to look interested as I kicked Pam's shin under the table as discretely as I could.

"They look like twins," Pam had snickered under her breath at one point and I had to stifle back the laughter that threatened to escape me. It was true; they were both strikingly tall and impossibly beautiful, with the same dark rich shade of cappuccino hair. Claudine was effusive, immediately taking to our small group like she had known us her entire life, while Claude, on the other hand, was less than friendly, to put it mildly.

"Sookie? That's a very unusual name," Claudine said politely. "Is it short for anything?"

"Well—"I started, but Pam jumped in before I could answer. I always get this question and it's understandable to a certain point. After all, Sookie isn't exactly a common name. I do, however, find it rude, as if I owe the world an explanation about my name. No one names themselves, now do they? It seems to me, if one is curious about a person's name, the last person they should be asking is that person. But I digress.

"It's a family name. You know those southerners with their weird little quirks." This wasn't the first time Pam had attempted to answer this question for me. Like I said, I always get it, and Pam, having been present plenty enough times to know how I answer, had long ago begun making up ridiculous explanations for me. One more outlandish than the next. This particular explanation was far tamer than her usual, something I was chalking up to the fact that Claudine was preternaturally nicer than we were used to strangers being.

"Oh, you're from the south! I just _adore _the south. Which part? Maybe I've been there. I've always fancied myself a little Scarlet O'Hara." Claudine, it seemed "just adored" everything. The squash blossoms, Pam's shoes, Amelia's hair. Louisiana? You guessed it. "Oh, Louisiana," she cooed, affecting the worst accent I had ever encountered. "I just adore New Orleans."

"Well, Bon Temps is a little far from New Orleans, but it is really beautiful there." I was trying to be polite, Pam on the other hand was having a bit of difficulty keeping the snark to a minimum. Pam has always been much the same drunk as she is sober, save for the fact that she just loses whatever mouth to brain filter she might possess.

"Forget Sookie, what about you and Claude? Happy coincidence or did one of you change your name? Or perhaps you just adore some southern traditions…" Pam trailed off, propping her hand under her chin, gazing at Claudine expectantly. I wasn't sure Claudine picked up on Pam's little insinuation, because she began to explain how they had met, and the "hysterical" discovery that they practically had the same name. She didn't mention why they looked exactly alike; one more glass in and I would have asked myself, except the second Amelia swallowed the last of her meal, Pam was trying to drag us out the door.

By the time we left we were on a first name basis with the majority of our fellow diners. On our way out the door people we had never met before were shaking our hands and hugging us. It was a bit on the surreal side; only with Amelia could you make friends like that. Pam hated everyone far too much to go out of her way to engage them in any sort of conversation, and I was far too shy to behave that way with strangers.

The three of us were walking, or more accurately, stumbling out of the restaurant, arm in arm in arm. We weren't drunk, but certainly well on our way. Somewhere in the intersection of tipsy and sloshed, I would say.

If drunken Pam could be described as uncensored, then Amelia is much the same. An immensely joyous drunk—as evidenced by her impromptu karaoke on the walk home, she is everyone's best friend, and though Amelia is by nature a kind person, she had a whole lot of love for the world through the shiny, happy, glow of Malbec.

We were tripping over each other, and ourselves, as we stumbled into Pam's apartment. Our laughter was perhaps several decibels too loud for the hour, and we were shushing each other in near screams all the way up the stairs—all five flights. I'm sure we were not making friends with any of her neighbors. Once inside, we filed into the kitchen, where we each took a seat on the high bar stools that were situated around the island. Pam's décor could be described as sterile, though she would call it chic, I'm sure. The white on white feel of the kitchen was a little cold for my tastes, but really, with the three of us sitting around the island, it felt intimate and homey.

"Oh, my feet," Amelia moaned, toeing off her heels and letting them drop with a thud. Sighing, she reached down and rubbed her instep. "I know that I am on my feet all day long, but I swear, I have never been in as much pain as I am right now."

"I could run a marathon in heels," Pam said. "Plus, they are so pretty and they make my legs look utterly fuckable." There was probably no limit to what Pam could do in heels; unless she was barefoot, there was no other acceptable footwear, in her opinion. Once I had gone on vacation with Pam, and we had ventured to the beach. I think she could have done without it, but one of my guilty pleasures in life is laying out in the sun, something I very rarely get to experience living in the city. I had worn a bikini, jean shorts and flip-flops, de rigueur for the beach as far as I was concerned. Pam had worn a vintage Rose Marie Reid bathing suit, that I am fairly certain was not meant to get wet, Louboutin peep toe pumps, and the largest, floppiest straw hat I have ever witnessed on anyone. It was somewhat ridiculous that Pam wore more to the beach than to a bar, but she was probably the sexiest woman on that beach.

"Yeah, that sounds like Pam," Amelia said after I shared the story. "I cannot believe you are from California. I just, I don't know—I can't see it at all. You're the quintessential New Yorker."

"It is not always about the amount of skin you show," Pam explained. "If you are at the beach then every Beth and Sherry is letting it all hang out, whether they should be or not. It's not about how much then; it's about showing the right stuff. Besides, I have to protect my skin." Pam had perfectly porcelain skin, a combination of good genes and a strict skin care regimen, which included SPF 30 every day for the past twenty-six years. She was convinced this would reduce her need for Botox later in life, and guarantee that she would look young forever.

"I didn't realize such thought went into these things," Amelia responded, her tone somewhere in between gently mocking and almost serious. I'm not sure it would have ever occurred to Amelia to put so much thought into beach attire, nor would it occur to anyone other than Pam. And perhaps Elizabeth Taylor.

Eventually we popped open another bottle of wine and migrated into the living room.

"Thanks for saving me some room," I grumbled sarcastically, when I returned from the bathroom to find my seat had been lost to Pam's legs. I pulled a pillow from the couch and dropped it onto the floor, carefully lowering myself until I was lying perpendicular to the couch, my legs stretched out before me.

"Here, this will make up for it," Amelia said sweetly, and a full glass appeared above my head. I reached up and grabbed it; very careful not to spill a drop, because even three sheets to the wind I knew Pam would permanently end me if I did any damage to her furniture. "So, What were we talking about?" she asked as she settled back on the couch.

"Were we talking about anything? What happened while I was gone?" I asked as I took a sip of wine and placed the glass on the floor next to me, in what was possibly the most complicated task I had attempted in my entire life. I hadn't been feeling that drunk up until that moment, but once I realized my basic motor functions had shut down, it was as though the haze just consumed my every thought.

"I honestly cannot even begin to remember," Pam said after a long silence, though it could have been a short one. I was experiencing some extreme time-space difficulties. She rolled over on her side to look over the edge of the couch at me. "You know, there is just something about spring," she said wistfully, apropos of nothing. I wasn't sure what she wanted me to say in response, so I just let her continue. "I don't know if it is the warm weather, or the change in the air, but God, it just makes me, I don't know—it makes me want to garden."

"What?" I said incredulously. "Shut up! I do not believe for one second that you have ever had even the smallest, most minute urge to garden. In the spring or otherwise."

"I don't know, I kind of agree. I think there is something about spring that makes me want to garden too," Amelia said slowly. I could tell she was really thinking about this from the tone in her voice, which only made it all seem that much more ridiculous.

"See?" Pam said snottily, "Amelia agrees. Two against one, we win."

"And just how long have you been experiencing these odd desires?" I asked.

"Sookie, you are just jealous that I am a better imaginary gardener than you."

"I, for one, happen to think that Pam would make a lovely gardener. Oh, with like, the little gloves and a shovel-thingy. You could even wear those ugly foam clogs in a really horrible color. With buttons. And a hat," Amelia's voice had taken on a very analytical tone. Yeah, she was definitely investing some heavy duty thought in this.

"A trowel, and I cannot see Pam in those clogs. Or any clogs. Clogs and Pam do not even belong in the same sentence."

"Trowel?" Pam questioned.

"The shovel-thingy," I replied.

"You aren't trying hard enough, Sookie. Pam would need the clogs if she gardened. I am, like, sixty four percent sure that the clogs are required garden wear." If we hadn't been drunk before, we were certainly drunk now. Our conversation had taken a horrific turn for the worst toward inebriated nonsense.

"Amelia, I love you, but you are too nice for your own good. Pam doesn't grow things, she kills them."

"I _am_ right here," Pam snapped.

"I know. I say these things to your face, that is what makes me a true friend."

"Well, that shirt you always wear? The one with the ruffle monstrosity going down the front?" Only Pam would begin attacking someone's wardrobe.

"Yeah?"

"It's ugly," Pam snipped and Amelia gasped loudly. Then, after a few moments of silence, I heard quiet snickering above my head.

"It is kind of ugly," Amelia squeaked out before she erupted into full on laughs.

Pam got off the couch and walked slowly out of the room, but not before muttering defensively, "You don't know everything about me. I could be an excellent gardener."

"Sookie," came Amelia's soft voice from somewhere above me. "I don't think I can move," she whispered and it sounded as if she might cry right before she burst into more laughter.

"Did I miss something?" Pam asked as she placed a water bottle into my outstretched hand and I sat up as slowly as I could manage.

"I don't think I can move to go home. Is it okay if I stay here? Or I could call Tray—" Amelia drifted off before she finished her sentence.

"God, of course you can stay. Don't be ridiculous." Pam disappeared from my line of vision again and Amelia's head popped out next to mine. It scared the shit out of me, and I began to choke on my water a little.

"Oh. My. Lord," I breathed, my hand involuntarily coming up to my chest, as though it could do anything to soothe the wild beating in my chest.

"Hi," she said and gave me the dopiest grin.

"Hi," I giggled back at her.

"My phone is way over there." Her hand stretched out and cut vaguely across the air. Her phone could have been anywhere, and really, for all she knew, it was. "Can I use yours?" I pulled my phone from the back pocket of my jeans and placed it into her still waving hand. Pam announced her return with a blanket to my face.

"Ow?" I called out from under the blanket. I wasn't feeling any pain, even if it had hurt. In a miraculous moment, Amelia remembered how to operate her limbs once more, and got up from the couch to make her phone call. I pulled myself up onto the couch, and stretched my legs out so that I was lying foot-to-head with Pam. "So," I said uncertainly, and tapped her lightly with the outside of my foot. "Why the girls night?"

She shrugged and took a sip of wine, looking down into the dark liquid long after she had finished drinking. "Just because, you know?" She said without meeting my eyes. I started to say something else when we heard Amelia screeching in the kitchen. "What is she doing?" Pam asked with a crooked smile, finally meeting my eyes.

"I have no clue," I said, and strained to hear what she was talking about. Just as I was about to call out to her, I heard it.

"I think you should just really pull your head out of your ass, Alcide. I mean she is hot."

"Oh my god, Amelia!" I yelled, leaping over the back of the couch faster than my brain could register that my body was moving. I tackled her to the ground, but she managed to squirm away and hold tight to the phone.

"She likes you too…No, I'm not drunk. I mean, yes, obviously, I have had a couple glasses of wine. I mean, I wouldn't even call it a couple of glasses. It was really more like the sum of one glass taken very small sips at a time. No, I wanted to talk to Tray, but then I saw your number in her phone. No, she doesn't mind at all, in fact she is trying to get the phone away from me right now, so she can talk to you herself." She was telling him all of this as I wrestled comically on the floor with her. My reflexes weren't in peak condition, and I was mostly just flailing around, because every time I managed some sort of grip on her, my muscles just seemed to let themselves go. My brain, however, was sober. Nothing killed my buzz faster than Amelia trying to convince Alcide I was hot. I was mortified. Thank god no one could see us on the floor, rolling around like a bunch of fools. Well, Pam could have, except she hadn't gotten off the couch. Choosing instead to laugh manically from the couch at what she imagined was happening in her kitchen, not two feet away.

I finally managed to free the phone from Amelia's death grip by poking her behind the knees, causing her to scream out in panicked squeals that resembled something close to a pig being slaughtered. Not that I had ever heard a pig being slaughtered. "Stop, stop," she begged, as she waved the phone in front of my face so that I would cease torturing her.

"That's what I thought," I said, taking the phone from her grasp and pulling myself up off the floor with as much dignity as I could manage at the moment. "Please ignore her," I spoke into the phone, trying to play it cool, but inside I was freaking out. I waited a beat, but there was no response. "Alcide?"

"What if I don't want to?" His voice was low, but I could hear the smile in his voice.

I didn't say anything. I couldn't. I was afraid if I opened my mouth, the wrong thing would come out, and so I just stood there looking down at Pam's ceramic kitchen floor, following the black and white checks with my eyes. Amelia was hovering so close that I was certain Alcide could hear her breathing into the phone.

"Don't want to what?" I asked, trying at coy.

"Go out with me, Sookie."

"'Kay," I said stupidly. It really wasn't one of my finest verbal moments.

"Yeah?" He sounded relieved and bit surprised. I couldn't imagine why he would have been surprised that I agreed to go out with him. He was good-looking, single, employed, and to my knowledge didn't have any frighteningly kinky sexual preferences; in my book that all added up to 'a catch'.

"Yes."

"Okay."

"Okay." I couldn't stop the laugh that escaped me. It was as though we had just agreed to a duel, not a date.

"I've gotta let Amelia call Tray now before she bursts." Also, I was anxious to end the call before I embarrassed myself further.

"I'll call you tomorrow?" he said and I imagined him doing this move where he stretches one of his arms high into the sky and just at the last moment lets it swoop down to grasp the back of his neck. It's quite adorable, really, and made incredibly sexy by all the tattoos he reveals when his arm is straight up like that.

"Bye." It was like we had suddenly turned into strangers. Four-year-old strangers, at that. It was awkward as hell, as if he didn't regularly raid my kitchen as though he owned the joint with Dave in tow, cackling about catching me naked one of these days. I ended the call and held the phone out for Amelia who was looking at me sheepishly.

"My finger slipped? You know, those new fangled touch screens and my fingers." She waved her fingers in front of my face, as if to demonstrate the full extent of their clumsiness.

"I should hate you," I told her with a smile. She gasped dramatically and grabbed the phone on her was past me.

"Won't they make the most beautiful babies?" She cooed to Pam as she climbed back over the arm of the couch into her previous position, pulling the blanket that I had dragged up there around her and leaning into Pam's shoulder.

"I don't know," Pam said thoughtfully. "Sookie and Eric have a lot of complimentary features. I think they would make some pretty kids."

"Oh, and we were doing so well!" I saw Amelia make eyes at Pam. "I thought there had been an unspoken moratorium on that subject, no?" Neither of them said anything, so I took the discarded blanket Amelia had left on the back of a chair and threw it down on the floor. I wrapped myself up and got comfortable. The sound of sirens and random screams could be heard coming up from the streets, the comforting lullaby of the city filling the small room with its reassuring melodies.

"Pam? I think you would be a really good gardener," I said with complete sincerity.

"Thank you, that's all I wanted." Pam replied.

The immense pain I experienced upon waking was almost enough to convince me that I should never drink again, but I soldiered on and managed to make it into the kitchen to find Pam and Amelia sitting at the island looking as bad as I felt. I sat down without saying a word, and neither of them bothered to lift their heads from their hands.

"I'm dying," Pam moaned painfully into the crook of her arm. I was in too much pain to even answer her.

Twenty minutes later, Amelia and I were walking on the street. Slowly. Very slowly. I squinted against the bright sun and cursed the fact that I hadn't thrown my sunglasses into my purse. My head was swimming, my back ached and I felt like I weighed a thousand pounds. In short, I was hung over something fierce and I doubted I would be drinking that again for a long time.

"This is me," Amelia said and I looked around to see I was mere blocks from my house.

"You okay to go it alone?" I asked, but internally I was dying and hoping that she would be fine, because I had the distinct feeling that the next place I went was where I was going to say for quite some time.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Are you all right? You look terrible. You look worse than when Dave he had that flu slash fever thing that had him puking in my kitchen sink—"

"I'm good," I said, rushing to cut her off. I had a clear image of Dave bent over Amelia's kitchen sink, barfing and moaning, for what had seemed like hours on end. The very thought of the smell from that day was churning my stomach so badly I thought I might toss my cookies then and there.

"Okay, well, I'll call you later to make sure you didn't die." She hugged me lightly, careful not to jostle me too much.

"Be careful," I called out to her as we parted ways. She reached a hand up to wave and disappeared around the corner.

I have never minded that I live in a walk up. Not really, anyway. It is more affordable and it gives me some bonus exercise every time I go anywhere. My ass gets a serious work out at least twice a day, eliminating the need for Pilates, simultaneously saving me money and toning a trouble area. That was when my face didn't feel like it was going to explode with every step I took. I had honestly convinced myself about twenty steps in to my treacherous trek that all the throbbing in my temples was indicative of an aneurysm and I was going to die on my way up to my apartment. At least I would be going out with a bang. I was desperate for a break, as pathetic as it sounds, but I knew that if I stopped, even for just the smallest second, I would never start up again. My apartment was Mecca, the couch was my promised land, and all I could focus on was putting one foot in front of the other, one step at a time, until I could die quietly in the comfort of my own home.

When I reached my door I thought I might sob out of sheer joy, but that was when I spotted Eric, limbs askew all over my promised land. I wanted to kill him, to choke him until he rolled off the couch and possibly killed himself on the way down, saving me the trouble. Alas, I was too ill to even attempt to push him off, and the option of moving one step further never even entered my mind as I slid into the open space in between his legs and the back of the couch. I closed my eyes and sighed deeply, letting the soft pillow behind my head soak up the weight of my exhaustion.

I felt his hand on my bare stomach before I even opened my eyes. His large hand, fingers spread, was snaked under my camisole, resting above the waistband of my jeans. I opened my eyes to see the back of my couch and the braid Amelia had painstakingly put into my hair last night undone and stuck to my face, obstructing the little vision I had. I closed my eyes again, almost immediately, willing the pain to cease from my poor head, which regardless of the peaceful rest, still felt like it might blow up at any moment. Eric shifted behind me, pulling my body flush against his, and buried his nose in the back of my neck.

"What are you doing?" I mumbled half into the pillow, half into my own hair.

"Snuggling," came his voice from behind me. His response reverberated through his chest, sending shivers immediately to places best left unmentioned. He breathed in deeply and pulled me just a little big tighter.

"Yeah, I got that part. It's the why I'm a bit fuzzy on."

"I woke up and here you were." Oh yeah, obviously. As simple as that.

"Why were you on the couch?" I had begun whispering, even though we were the only two people in the place and both of us were certainly awake. It somehow required less effort to speak softly than at a normal volume.

"I was waiting for you." This was the most painfully drawn out conversation ever. I wasn't in the mood, either. He knew what I was asking, and yet he was being purposefully evasive. Meanwhile, I didn't even attempt to remove his hand from my stomach, instead I simply let him hold me, content to bask in the security of his embrace while I interrogated him about our current state.

"Why?"

"I heard you were pretty wrecked last night. I know first hand how that goes and I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You never came home." I wasn't too sure what to say to that and even thinking about it was too much effort. Whatever conversation we were about to have, I did not have it in me to do so at that moment, so I just relaxed back into him, letting the sleep swallow me whole.

When I awoke again the sun was shining into my eyes. I was no longer on the couch, but in my bed. There was a glass of water and several aspirin on the table within arms reach. I sat up, cautious of moving too quickly, and reached out for the water, not concerning myself with how I had gotten from the couch to my room. When I had regained my bearings I sought out my phone and found that I had four missed calls: one from Pam, two from Amelia and one from Alcide. The lone text waiting for me read: 'Saturday?' It was from Alcide. I smiled to myself in the quiet of my room and hunkered down once again under the covers to call him back.

**…..**

"I look like fucking Donna Reed," I said in exasperation, running my hands repeatedly down the puffy fabric of my skirt. "Does it just scream domesticity?" I asked Eric, sitting across the room, while I turned from side to side as though the angle would change the way I felt about the white skirt sitting high at my waist, flaring out to just above my knees. There was something about the red flowers all over it in combination with the solid black tights I was sporting that made me feel like a Goth Susie Homemaker. I had been aiming for Zooey Deschanel, but in reality I think I ended up more along the lines of Sandy from _Grease _meets Emily the Strange. It wasn't really working for me. I fiddled with the collar of my shirt, tucked severely into the skirt and I wondered aloud if it might cause some sitting dilemmas later in the evening. All I was getting in response were random grunts and the steady clickclickclick of the Xbox controller, so I just gave up looking at myself and bent under the couch to seek out the platform mary janes that I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, had landed there as a result of getting final jeopardy wrong two weeks ago. Don't ask.

I was in the midst of a crisis. Alcide had seen me in sweatpants, in my crappy, unappealing leggings and oversized sweatshirts. Not that he hadn't also seen me dressed nicely, but for some reason, at that exact moment it felt that all the good times were canceled out by the disheveled mess that I usually was.

"Could I please have a male opinion here? I am freaking out." I finished buckling my shoe and stood before him for his examination, arms awkwardly at my sides, shoulders back, awaiting the worst.

"I'd fuck you," he mumbled with a hint of humor and raise of his eyebrow as he kept his focus on the screen, still tapping away at the controller. I wasn't sure if I was meant to have heard him or not.

"Ugh, you are so crude! Never mind, I don't want your opinion anyway." I probably shouldn't have laughed, the last thing Eric needed was encouragement, but I couldn't help myself. I halfheartedly threw a pillow at his head, which of course he ducked without even glancing at it, causing him to laugh uproariously and almost cost him a life in the game he was playing.

He smiled that damned smile and pressed pause. "So sorry to offend your delicate sensibilities, Mrs. Reed, but if I recall correctly, five seconds ago you dropped an eff bomb yourself."

I fought the urge to return his smile and simply said, "You are so entirely the opposite of helpful. All I want is an honest opinion and you cannot even be bothered to look at me." His hand flew up, two fingers outstretched, in a motion that I knew was supposed to mean we had established eye contact. It was a running joke we had established long ago. He had seen a cartoon character performing this same motion last week and had become obsessed with it, like he had begun a 'thing', doing it whenever an opportunity presented itself. I rolled my eyes and sat down on the couch a safe distance away. "Do you think I should cut my hair?" I mused out loud, though mostly to myself, as I studied the ends of my curls in front of my face.

"No, you should never cut your hair. Ever. Do you think I should cut my hair?" He then paused the game again and began playfully mocking me by twirling his hands around in the ends of his hair. I seriously doubted that I looked as goofy as he did right then and told him so. "It's just a generalized female impersonation, not you specifically, Stackhouse. Besides, you know I love you."

"Yeah, yeah," I said dismissively with a roll of my eyes, but I couldn't wipe the smile from my face. Eric had been in a considerably better mood the past week, always playful and nice. He had suddenly taken to being home alone a great deal, forgoing his usual nightly fornications for mindless television shows and endless hours of Xbox. At first I had been a little weirded out by his constant presence, but it really wasn't that bad having him around without the presence of mysterious women in my home.

"You know, maybe you should cut your hair," I said seriously, trying to picture how he would look if he were clean cut. The idea of a well-groomed Eric almost seemed sacrilegious.

"What?" he practically screamed back at me, obviously horrified I would even entertain the idea. All of the kidding was now forgotten. I had insulted his pride and joy.

"Yeah, I don't know. It's a little Kurt Cobain sometimes." I tried to hide my smile behind my hands, but it was to no avail. Eric couldn't stand Kurt Cobain, a fact that I'm fairly certain he made known to anyone who would listen.

"Kurt Cobain? Fuck that, this is all Eric Northman." With an overly dramatic huff he turned back around and resumed play for a few moments before once again pausing it and turning to me. "Really?" he asked sweetly, flashing me his best puppy dog eyes.

"Oh sweet Jesus," I laughed loudly and playfully swatted his hair. "Heavens. What ever would the world do if you cut your hair? It'd be like Justin Beaver all over again."

This set Eric off into a fit of hysterics. "Bieber," he gasped out in between howls of laughter.

"What?"

"The kid's name is Justin Bieber, not Beaver."

"Oh," I said thoughtfully, a little embarrassed. "That makes a huge difference in my mind, for some reason. I don't know which is more concerning, the fact that you didn't dispute the hair thing, or the fact that you know the kid's name."

All I heard was more clickclickclick in response.

"Oh! Do you know one of his songs?" I asked excitedly. He didn't say anything, but I saw the corners of his mouth quirk up. "Ah! Oh no, I was kidding, but you do. You totally know one of his songs. Will you sing it for me?"

"No," he snorted.

"No you don't know it or no you won't sing it?" He laughed in response, trying to ignore me in favor of the game, but unable to keep a straight face long enough to concentrate.

"Baby, baby, baby…ooooh," I crooned off-key, much to Eric's amusement. That was all I knew, so I sang it a few more times, getting progressively worse as I went on when the buzzer sounded.

I immediately thought I might throw up. I had all of a sudden become irrationally nervous about this date, and the somersaults my stomach was doing weren't making things any better. While Eric pretended to regain focus on his game I went to the door and waited as Alcide made the hike up the stairs. My eye practically glued to the peephole alerted me to Alcide's arrival, causing me in a slightly more stalker-ish way than I would have preferred to have the door open as soon as he stepped in front of it.

"Whoa," he said with a giant smile on his face as he took me in. I was probably blushing from head to toe, a mixture of embarrassment and nerves, and I had the goofiest smile planted on my face. "All set?" He offered his outstretched hand to me, palm up. I slid my hand into his and felt his fingers close around it, making it seem that much smaller, and just as soon as they came, the nervous drained from my body. Replaced by a steady, encouraging hum of anticipation.

"Let's go." I smiled and gathered my things. "Bye, Eric," I said over my shoulder as I closed the door.

He hadn't acknowledged Alcide, nor had Alcide said anything to him. I sensed a bit of tension that I couldn't exactly pinpoint, but I thought it unwise to draw attention to it, so I pushed it to the back of my mind to mull over later and tried to focus on enjoying my night with Alcide.

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**Author's Note**: has been on the fritz since I last posted. I understand it's all cleared up now, but if I didn't respond to your review last chapter I do apologize. I love reading everything that you all have to write. All the pm's/alerts/favorites are appreciated from the bottom of my little heart.


	11. LiebesLied

**I really want to start out by thanking you all for taking this whole Alcide thing in stride. You have been accepting of him with a grace that I did not think possible considering this is an Eric/Sookie story. Especially after reading DR. I mean, honestly, as if it wasn't already difficult to like Alcide? **

**I don't own anything. The title is a Rilke poem (in English it is simply Love Song). Thank you to krtmd.**

* * *

Chapter Eleven: Liebes-Lied

If I had a word to sum up the few romantic fumblings in my life thus far it would be awkward. Me, them, all of it–awkward. Capital a, bold, italicized, underlined. Will, my first boyfriend, had been awkward all on his own, without any assistance from me. Our courtship was mostly accidental and I wouldn't necessarily attribute our togetherness to an effort on either of our parts. Quinn, on the other hand, had certainly made a great deal of effort. That is until he stopped making the effort, but I had most definitely been the awkward piece of that puzzle. He had been so opposite of me in every way that I was always just so off put by the idea that he wanted to be with me. Perhaps that is why things went the way they did. Or, who knows, maybe it would have happened the same way even if I was less baffled by his attraction to me. In retrospect we would have never lasted, but at least I could have saved myself a teensy bit of heartache.

I had thought, for sure, that Alcide and I would be different. After all, I had never been friends with anyone before entering into a relationship with them. There was a pre-existing level of comfort there that I had naturally assumed would cross over with our evolution from friends to well, lovers, I suppose, but I hadn't gotten that far yet. How wrong I was. Walking down the street, side by side, not touching, but almost, was nearly physically painful it was so awkward. And ridiculous. One of us needed to break the ice, to ease the palpable tension that threatened to strangle any hopes of another date out of us with every step that we took.

"Where are we going?" I asked, trying so desperately to sound cool and unaffected and generally like I wasn't nearly crawling out of my skin from the discomfort of it all.

He grinned and reached back to rub his neck several times before allowing his hand to fall back down limply between us. The rough tips of his fingers running along the back of my hand with every swing of his arms. I should have just flipped my hand over, taken control of the situation and put an end to the nonsense, but instead I chose to swing my arm just a fraction of second later than I had been, in hopes that he would accidentally catch my hand. He obviously couldn't read minds. My stomach flipped with nerves, the opportunity presenting itself and passing us by with each wave of our arms, and I remembered why I hadn't dated anyone since Quinn. It was all so much effort.

"Lulu's," he finally answered, though the way his voice rose at the end made it sound more like a question and immediately began to ramble. "Is that okay? We can go somewhere else if you want. I am not really sure where to go, but if there is somewhere you were thinking of then that's fine with me too. Hell, we could have hot dogs and I would be thrilled just to be sitting next to you— " As much as I wanted to allow him to continue his adorable rant I rushed to assure him it was fine before he talked us out of our entire date.

"I've never been there. What kind of food do they serve?" See? Look at that, moving conversation right along now.

"Diner food, mostly, but they have something like forty different varieties of soup on any given day. Which, really, is just awesome because I'm not even sure I could name that many different kinds of soup. Wow, I sound like some weird soup enthusiast, don't I? I'm not unnaturally obsessed with soup, just so you know, and I have no idea why I keep saying soup now."

I laughed a little, trying not to embarrass him, but he was just on the verge of breaking a sweat and it was simply endearing to watch. "Soup is good."

"Good," he said and visibly relaxed. "Oh, here. This is us." He stopped abruptly and gestured to the subway entrance. We descended the stairs, still close but not touching and I sensed he wanted to say something. "I'm not crazy, right? This is unfathomably awkward."

"Oh my god," I breathed; relieved that we were finally addressing the giant elephant that had been practically sniffing our butts from the second we had left my apartment. "I know what you mean. Doesn't it feel like it shouldn't be this hard?"

I had been operating under the assumption that Alcide was reserved because of the company he kept. I mean, honestly, if you knew how Tray, Dave and Eric could be when they were all in one room together, unsupervised and uncut, you would make the same assumption. As it turned out, Alcide was just Alcide, regardless of whom else was around and though at first the quiet was a bit unnerving, it was slowly growing on me. He was pensive, to say the least, but incredibly fascinating. It was as though he took great care to consider every word before it left his mouth—the complete opposite from me, who just lets words fly at the first sign of a nervous twitch. I was still feeling uncomfortable, but it was slowly morphing into an excited nervousness rather than puke inducing, which was a nice change.

As we descended the stairs to the subway he began telling me this long rambling story about his love for the subway. He likened it to a crowd at a concert, all shoved in to one room together, shoulder-to-shoulder, but purposely ignoring one another. He said it was one of his favorite parts of the city and I didn't have the heart to tell him that I avoided the subway at all cost. It was incredible; the depths to which he brought this thought and I just listened intently, all the while thinking I never knew anyone could be so passionate about the subway.

He mentioned that for as long as he had been a musician he had wanted to busk in the subway, but never worked up the nerve to do it alone. It may sound strange, but there is something wonderful about musicians camped up along narrow underground hallways that smelled like piss and indiscernible waste, playing their hearts out for unappreciative masses. I understood Alcide's admission, because if I had even one musical bone in my entire body I would be right there with him. Unfortunately, in the cruelest twist of fate, despite my passionate love for music, I couldn't play a goddamn note.

He guided me along, hand on the small of my back, down the platform. When we had reached an area that was relatively far from the commotion that Alcide apparently found beautiful, he pulled me up against the wall with him so that we were facing the tracks. We made meaningless small talk every few moments, but for the most part we were fairly silent. From the corner of my eye I observed his features. The deep tan of his skin revealed long hours spent working out in the sun. I hadn't ever really given a close look to Alcide's tattoos, when you glazed over them it created just sort of a blur, but standing so close to him, I began to examine the dark lines that alternated between thick and thin all along his skin. The sleeve on the arm closest to me was a scene that depicted a pack of wolves spread out in a forest. Tree leaves, tiny and perfect, covered the majority of his impressive arm.

"How do they get them so small and still get them to look so perfect?" My hands went to his arm of their own accord and I began absently tracing the images on his skin. I had been thinking out loud and I know I sounded a little stupid, but I had never really seen many tattoos up close and personal. I had thought from time to time about getting a tattoo, mentally mapping out what design I would want, etc. But the thought of so many little needles dragging through my flesh made me edgy.

At my question he let out a gruff chuckle.

"Sorry, that was stupid."

"No," he assured me kindly. "I actually have no idea. If you see them doing it you only get more confused. When they work on it there is ink bleeding out all over my arm. So, I am not even sure how they know what they are doing at all. But," he paused with a shrug and lightly touched my hand that was still tracing the black lines. "When they wipe all the ink away, it's always perfect."

I let my hand drop and raised my eyes to his face. He was smiling and I could see that we had just jumped over some invisible hurdle. The man standing there was the Alcide I knew, free of the awkwardness that had morphed us into virtual strangers. The distant sound of a train bearing down on us could be heard through the tunnel and there was a sudden and fast migration to the edge of the platform. Alcide smiled once more, just a little wider and gripped my hand as he began to pull me forward.

As we stood at that foreboding, yellow caution line, my hand in his, the warm air from the tracks pushed against my face and blew my hair back. It was almost suffocating, the pressure pushing the air back inside of my lungs. Strangely, though, it felt good. I felt as though I were on the verge of something. What, I wasn't sure, but I tried not to over think it as I let Alcide lead me into the car.

The restaurant was a nondescript glass storefront set further back from the other buildings, so much so, that unless you knew exactly what you were looking for, you would never be able to find this place. He pulled the door to the restaurant open and motioned for me to go in. I smiled my thanks and took a small step into the building. It resembled a Parisian café, or at least the Parisian café of my mind considering I had never stepped foot outside of the states. It was a combination of _Sabrina _and _Amélie, _and I was glad to see that I had dressed the part.

An unbelievably emaciated woman with a horrible red dye job greeted us and led us with an over exaggerated flourish to a small table that was practically on top of the bar. She handed us a sheet of paper each and quickly rambled off the specials. As soon as she left I began looking over the options. The menu was hardly what one would expect from a place that was as charmingly chic as Lulu's. Along side a curious entrée of roasted marrow bones, tonight they were offering the 'grown up grilled cheese', which was Jarlsberg cheese on whole-wheat sourdough bread with truffle oil. I opted for the later with a cup of creamy butternut squash soup, which seemed a little out of season to me, but I thought it was an intriguing meal. Alcide despite his soup spiel ended up with the aforementioned roasted marrow bones with parsley salad. I had never even heard of such a thing, so naturally I was intensely curious about this choice.

"So, Alcide Herveaux, tell me about yourself." I prompted; taking what I hoped was a delicate sip of the water that had been placed on the table in front of me.

"What is that you would like to know, Miss Stackhouse?" He responded, playing along with a smile creating just the tiniest hint of a dimple in his cheek.

"Family? Or, how about your job? What made you choose construction work out of all of the possibilities in the entire world? You are certainly a talented musician, and I've seen the kinds of stuff you read…" I trailed off a little, trying not to insult him or his career choice. Construction was honorable, and I certainly had no problem with anyone who wanted to do an honest days work.

With an equally formal tone he answered me. "It is my father's company. He was young when he started it, just married to my mother and I think he really loved it back then, but as he got older he just loved it a little less. And then she died and he didn't love it at all anymore. He got himself into some pretty bad debt and I decided to take over and help him out. Now, I don't know. I guess I could leave, but I stay. How 'bout you? Did you always want to write?"

"I think once I considered becoming an international pop star," I confessed teasingly. He laughed easily and I began explaining my lifelong love affair with books. Literature, of all things, turned out to be something Alcide and I had very much in common.

Through the rest of dinner we discussed every book either of us had ever read. I explained the genius of Haruki Murakami and insisted that he immediately seek out _The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle_. Alcide tried to convince me that James Joyce was the way to go and I nearly cried I laughed so hard. It was my opinion that no one ever read Joyce for enjoyment, but he stood firm.

"You should read _A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man_, I think you would really enjoy it."

"Oh my god, I can't even begin to dredge up any desire to lie to you about this."

He laughed, long and loud. At the sound of his voice ringing out into the night air as we walked back towards the subway, I felt the smallest twinge of disappointment in my chest. I wasn't sure why, but I thought of Eric for a brief moment.

It was strange, since we knew each other to a certain extent, but dating invited all sorts of other personal information front and center that wasn't necessary to divulge to someone you just considered a friend. I was a little reluctant to share all my personal details outright, but he seemed completely at ease sharing stories about his family and dating history.

"Debbie was a little crazy," he confessed while I was skirting around the issue of exes on the subway platform, awaiting our train. I knew limited amounts about Debbie through Amelia. Now and then someone else would mention Debbie, but the full story was never given to me. "I guess I was a little blinded by my love for her."

He rattled on and on, but I had enjoyed it, glad to let him talk as I sat back and listened. He had a wonderful sense of humor that was often overshadowed by the large personalities of his friends. As he stood over me on the train, leaning heavily on the bar above my head he said something that particularly captured my attention. He mentioned that some A&R guys were courting the band, but that they weren't certain where it was going to lead. After he explained this all he had confessed that he thought Eric would have already told me all about it.

"Eric and I don't talk," I scoffed. Who knew if Eric even had the ability to have a serious conversation with any woman for more than ten minutes without either insulting her intelligence or offering to sleep with her. I found it incredibly strange that Alcide seemed to think Eric and I had that kind of friendship and it led me to wondering if Eric ever talked about me with the guys.

"Ah, well, he's all pissy about it because he thinks that signing with this label will compromise our integrity." He used air quotes around integrity and it just hit me wrong. I agreed with Eric, the major label that was wanting to sign them was nothing more than a big machine that would milk them for all they were worth before burying them under legalese that would prevent them from having independent creative control over their own music. I didn't say any of this to Alcide, though, because it just seemed unnecessary to stir up shit because of it. Slowly this comment was forgotten and we fell back into the easy conversation we had been having.

Now returning home, we had begun to play a game. It had been dubbed 'top five' and the logistics of it were just that, to create a list of top fives. The boys played this game, relentlessly ranking and re-ranking every experience, every vice, every yen they have ever had. I mostly ignored them, there was no point in even trying to get into the middle of the madness, but it drove Amelia nuts. She had even gone so far as to ban it from dinner conversation. As a result of the game I knew that Eric ranked chocolate milk above hot chocolate, Tray preferred Skittles to any other candy and Dave had disconcertingly strong opinions about Transformers. Sometimes the game went for days, sometimes weeks. In a way, I suppose it never ended; it was like a comforting background noise.

Alcide was giving me his rundown of all time guilty pleasure songs.

"Separate Ways by Journey, The Goonies song, anything by Bloodhound Gang, Cracklin' Rosie by Neil Diamond and finally, um, oh, Total Eclipse of the Heart with Meatloaf and Bonnie Tyler. Right? That was Bonnie Tyler?"

I was laughing too hard to even confirm that I thought he was right. Almost doubled over on the sidewalk, I reached out an arm to his leg to hold myself up.

"Shut up," he said with a good-natured laugh. "Alright, chuckles, let's hear your picks." I let out a few more laughs before I managed to regain my composure and began walking again as I thought out my list.

"I hate this game," I pouted. "It's too hard to think of things on the spot."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't wuss out on me now. I told you mine so it's only fair if you tell me yours."

"Fine," I conceded. "Let me think." I wracked my brain for even one song that I had ever heard. My thoughts were whooshing right by me, so fast I couldn't get a hold of them, like I had never compiled a list of anything in my entire life. The pressure was insane. To think that the guys did this all the time just astounded me; I could never find enjoyment in having to constantly come up with witty lists on a moments notice. This wasn't fun, it was torture. It was like school all over again, only not the fun things that I was good at. It was like recess. Social torture parading as fun.

"Alright, alright, alright. I got it." I was waving my hands in front of my body like some deranged traffic cop. This elicited a barking laugh from Alcide, which I ignored as I began my list. "Brand New Key by Melanie, anything by ABBA, that Coldplay song about, oh…you know—with the piano and whatever." He was giving me a look that told me no one in the world could possibly ever figure out what song I was talking about, but he was also laughing while shaking his head so I just waved my hands to signify that I was moving on. "Love is Alright Tonight by Rick Springfield and uh, Danny's Song."

"I don't even know who sings that."

I blushed and debated whether or not I should tell the truth. Well, I already admitted that I liked ABBA, how much worse could it get? "Kenny Loggins," I mumbled and followed it up with a cough for good measure.

"I said guilty pleasure, not to name the song that you should never admit to anyone that you actually enjoy."

"Oh my god, I hate you."

"Whoa, you're the one confessing your love for Kenny Loggins."

"You said guilty pleasure!" I said defensively.

"Yeah, and now I wish I hadn't." I playfully punched his arm, for all the good it would do me, and he merely laughed as he wrapped his arm around my shoulders.

"I don't even want to play anymore. What's next?" I was trying to keep my lower lip out in a pout, but every time Alcide looked down at me he would laugh and squeeze my shoulders until my lip curled in with a smile.

"Top five kisses." He said when we were only a few blocks from my house.

I blushed and debated how honest I should be at this moment. I had not even kissed five men in my life and even still, out of the four I would hardly rank any of them 'top' anything. The only kisses of note had been courtesy of Eric Northman and that wasn't really something I wanted to divulge to one of his closest friends while on a date. Somehow I thought that it might send the wrong impression. In the end I told him that I hadn't been kissed properly by that many people, so I really had nothing to measure them against.

He regarded me with a very serious look for a moment longer than was comfortable and then suddenly began to talk about my horrible musical tastes. I was a little thrown off at the abrupt change in subject, but shook it off, not wanting to end the date as awkwardly as it had begun.

We reached my stoop and I climbed a few steps to place myself at eye level with Alcide.

"Thank you for a lovely evening."

"Do you think you would want to have a lovely evening again sometime?"

I scrunched up my face and looked up to the sky as though I were considering it. "Eh." I shrugged finally and had to fight the smile that was forming despite my best efforts to keep a serious face.

The mood turned serious very quickly and my stomach jumped just the slightest bit. He leaned closer to me and cupped my face in his large hands. When the tip of his nose brushed mine I could feel his breath against my mouth and I licked my lips in anticipation. Very slowly, he pressed his mouth to mine. I sighed and parted my mouth, darting my tongue out to taste his lips. His tongue responded and he begun slowly sucking at my lips, kneading with his teeth. I was breathless; it was totally unexpected from the practically chaste way we had begun. There was nothing violent or demanding about this kiss, though, it was tentative and exploratory. He gently traced my mouth with his tongue, not forcing into my mouth but memorizing its curves. I responded just as gently, but passionately and he in turn pulled me closer in his large arms, covering my body with his own shielding us both from the outside world. I was light headed when he finally pulled away and rested his forehead against mine.

"Okay." I was dazed. It was a good kiss. "Well, goodnight." I sort of stumbled up the stairs and he followed close behind, his hand guiding me from the small of my back. I fumbled with my keys and he waited patiently as I unlocked the door and pushed it open to stand in the doorway. We stood there having a final awkward moment and he kissed me softly just once more. As we parted ways with a promise of talking soon I slipped into the building as headed up the stairs. On that long walk I began to think about Eric, wondering if he were upstairs or if he had gone out. I tried to tell myself it didn't matter, that I had been out with Alcide tonight. Then I replayed the kisses and couldn't help but compare them with Eric's kisses.

Kissing Alcide was nice. It was warm and comforting, but kissing Eric—kissing Eric was decidedly different. I tried not to dwell on what it was like kissing Eric; it didn't matter because it wouldn't be happening again any time soon. I reminded myself that substance dictated a slow burn, a building up of emotions and not a firework display explosion that was really nice for all of a few hours before it fizzled into thin air. Alcide and I were substance, Eric was fizzle.

I pushed the weight of my body against the door as I opened it and noticed the apartment was dark. Not bothering to turn on any lights, I slipped my shoes off by the door and tiptoed barefoot to my room, taking note of the distinct lack of Eric. I stripped down into my underwear and shimmied down under the blankets, reflecting on my night and feeling all around satisfied that for the first time in so many months I had successfully completed a very normal date. Awkwardness and all.

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**I will confess, Alcide's love for subways is totally my own. If you are ever in Barcelona make sure you check out the Liceu station, it is my favorite in the world. ABBA really is a good band. And everyone should read Murakami.  
**

**And a question. Would any of you be interested in reading this story from Eric's POV as an entirely separate entity? I've been working on it, debating whether or not to publish it now and let the stories get caught up to one another or to wait until I have finished this story and then post it. Thoughts or opinions on the matter would be greatly appreciated.**

**Oh man, I almost forgot! I am now offering my services as a beta! Should you or anyone you know be in need of beta services I would love it if you would consider me for the job. I'm blushing just trying to pimp myself out, but honestly I just want to toss it out there.  
**


	12. The In Between Parts

**Author's Note: So, ah…it's been awhile. I have a story, mostly sad and a little boring, but I'm sure you'd all just rather read the chapter. Without further ado…**

**I don't own anything. There is no music. A giant thank you to my beta _krtmd_. And thanks to_ zairre_ (who offered her computer to me when I was in need even though she lives practically on the opposite side of the world).**

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**Chapter Twelve: The In Between Parts**

I slept restlessly that morning, turning over repeatedly to see the clock every fifteen minutes like clockwork. I wasn't dreaming, per se, but thoughts were running rampant through my head, vague and insignificant matters, the kinds of things that only bother you when you can't pinpoint your anxiety so you create reasons for why you must be feeling that way. I took a final look at the clock and saw that it read 7:38. No matter how many times I blinked my eyes in a futile attempt to convince myself that it was, in fact, a lucid dream and I could will myself back to a reasonable hour, I couldn't seem to convince the clock as much.

At first I rolled onto my back, my body protesting what my mind already knew—I was awake. I dressed lazily, not giving much thought to how I looked, just interested in willing my groggy limbs to function. I ventured out in search of coffee, and when I reached the kitchen I found Eric in his usual place on the counter, having a silent, but obviously tense conversation with none other than Pam. I don't know which surprised me more, Eric's awful, aged, weary appearance in the same clothes from the night before, or the sight of Pam in my kitchen before a decent hour, giving a somewhat muted third degree to Eric about god knows what. Before they noticed me, I heard Pam's distinctively shrill voice demanding he 'do something about it' in the most demanding whisper I had ever heard.

"Do something about what?" I asked through an embarrassingly large yawn, lifting my hand up just a fraction too late to cover my mouth. I obviously scared the shit out of Pam, who jumped almost a foot into the air at the sound of my voice.

"The fact that he's such a pussy," Pam spat out, appearing from out behind him only to push her way past to the hallway. "Bagels on the counter," she called out in a slightly less hostile tone. My bedroom door shut firmly behind her.

I moved forward to pour myself some coffee, stirring it several time with the spoon that was sitting on a napkin in front of the pot, licking it clean before I returned it to its place, carefully avoiding making eye contact with Eric. I knew I had been out on a date the night before, and it was unfair and certainly unfounded for me to feel any jealousy, but the sight of him in the same clothes as the night prior, combined with the fact that I knew damn well he hadn't slept here riled up hurt feelings that I was trying to tamp down with quick sips of scalding coffee.

"What was that about?" I asked aloud to the kitchen at large as I cautiously peeked inside the paper bag that was to my right.

When I didn't receive a response for several moments I looked up to find that Eric was standing now, but still in the same spot in front of the counter, pinching the bridge of his nose with a finger and thumb, his eyes squeezed shut. He looked tired. His hair and practically half his face were hidden beneath a black knit beanie, just the finest of blonde strands poking out from the stretchy fabric. The v-neck of his tight white t-shirt exposing the unusual anchor-like necklace he always wore. Finally, as though my gaze were calling to him, he opened his eyes, staring blankly at me—it was as though he didn't see me at all.

I cautiously approached him, coffee cup in one hand and placed the palm of the other on his chest, fingers splayed across the very place I had imagined touching so many times before. I stared at my hand on his chest for a while. I wasn't sure what had possessed me to do it, but standing there, focused on my almost foreign looking fingers as they pressed lightly into his soft yet firm cotton clad chest, I felt a pang in my chest as I thought of Alcide. That feeling was like a jolt back to reality, and I made to pull my hand away. I was stopped, though, by his large grasp around my wrist, holding me in place. I tilted my head back and met his dark, melancholy gaze in my own. Everything in me yearned to get closer, to feel him, to breathe him in, but that got me to thinking of kissing him, and then kissing Alcide, and I knew this was wrong. I remembered all my arguments for why this was a bad idea and pulled my hand away, despite his penetrating gaze urging my body to do everything but increase the distance between us.

I looked down to the floor and silently left the room, abandoning my bagel and Eric in the kitchen, oddly equally sad about both losses.

I slipped into my room and shut my bedroom door behind me. I wanted to confront Pam about her argument with Eric, about why she would even be awake at this ungodly hour, let alone in my house scolding Eric in near whispers. I didn't, though; I merely silently took a place beside her on my bed and regarded her with a meaningful look.

"I broke up with Andre." The way she said the words broke my heart. It wasn't as though Pam had never ended a relationship before. As a matter of fact, Pam was always the one ending the relationships. Usually, though, it was done with great indifference and very little production. The fact that she was even discussing this at all was a major moment for her, but the hollow sad tone in her voice, the one that for anyone else would be indicative of tears to come, revealed how deeply this affected her.

I sought out her hand resting upon the blanket and squeezed lightly. We both sat there for a moment, waiting for something to happen. Perhaps we were waiting for the world to end. It almost felt that way.

"He—" She faltered, took a deep, shaky breath and forcefully exhaled. "He just wanted something that I could never be for him. Somebody I could never be." I nodded in understanding. Pam was such a strong, self-sufficient woman. Despite the deep emotional issues, she neither needed nor wanted anyone to come to her rescue. I admired this about her and understood completely why she felt as though she couldn't just abandon who she was as a person, regardless of the feelings she clearly had for this man.

"The worst part," she took another deep shuddering breath and I knew she was doing her best to keep her emotions in check. It would have been all right for her to cry. Here, at this moment, alone with me. That wasn't the point though, not for Pam anyway. The point was that she was stronger than that. "The worst part was that I almost wanted to change for him."

As she told me of the demise of her relationship I found that I was surprisingly envious of her. Pam was so self assured, so strong that even though she had felt more for this guy than her last ten boyfriends combined she was walking away in the name of self preservation. I wondered, sitting there just lightly holding onto my best friend's hand while she stared holes into the wall, if I could ever know myself so fully; I wondered if I could ever be as strong as her.

I gave her the basic details of my date with Alcide, leaving out anything too particular. The last thing I wanted to do was make her feel worse about her newly single status. We chatted, about nothing and everything, the way that old friends do when there are more important things to be said and no one wants to say them. It wasn't avoidance; it was self defense, learned the hard way over many years of broken hearts. Ours and others.

"Do you know where he was last night?" she asked seemingly out of nowhere, inclining her head towards the door.

"Who?" I was thinking that I had never even met Andre, how could I have possibly known where he was last night. Or any other night for that matter.

"Eric," she replied, pronouncing his name slowly.

"Where?" I asked, mimicking her slow speech. Eric had two statuses in my world. There and not there. It was a complete mystery what happened to Eric once he stepped outside of that door. Obviously, on occasion, I would encounter him in the outside world—Amelia's, Lou's, what have you—but the Eric that I saw outside of the confines of the apartment was nothing like the man I lived with. I had used to think that there was just two versions of Eric—stage Eric and real Eric, but I was beginning to discover that there was no limit to the many personas of Eric Northman. Truth be told, I didn't want to know where he had been last night. His appearance had told me all I needed to know about where he had been and the sting could still be felt. I knew, rationally, that I had no claim to him. But since when had rationality played into any of it?

"He was sitting on Amelia's couch drinking himself into oblivion." I obviously didn't provide her with the reaction she was expecting because she forged on. "According to Amelia it was tragic. He was bemoaning the loss of you all night, it was like you had fucking died."

"The only thing Eric lost was the competition," I snorted with derision. I wasn't going to for one moment even allow myself to be so deluded as to believe that Eric felt anything other than defeat. "His little bender was a symptom of his wounded pride. Nothing more."

She rolled her eyes as if I were truly clueless. "That boy is fucking stupid for you and one day you will both pull your heads out of your asses long enough to see it. Mark my words, Stackhouse."

This little revelation gave me brief pause. I felt a sick thrill at the thought of the notoriously unfaithful and emotionally unavailable Eric Northman drinking himself into a mess over me. Let's be real, what woman wouldn't get weak-kneed over a burgeoning rockstar pining away for them? In the end, though, prudence outweighed fantasy, as it always does for me. The thing was, Eric was just too much of a gamble. Women always want to believe they can tame the bad boy, that it will be different with them; women want to believe that we can change men. We are stupid creatures that way, because time and time again men disappoint us. They fall short of our expectations

When I walked her to the door several hours later the exhaustion read all over her face. She looked older than usual and a little worn around the edges. She repeatedly assured me she would be fine, but I had only asked once and I thought she kept saying it more for her own benefit than for mine. I hugged her fiercely before she left; not offering any empty words that everyone always felt that they needed to say in moments like these. When Quinn and I had broken up Pam had shown up and let me rage, vent, and generally fall apart without meaningless, trite clichés. I owed her that much at least.

As I was heading back to my room I spotted Eric's door open a crack, but there was no sound coming from within. I cautiously approached the door and tapped as unobtrusively as I could. When I heard something that didn't resemble any words in the English language as far as I knew I pushed it just a fraction wider to see Eric sprawled out across his bed, face down, arms hanging over the side.

I will never know what compelled me to Eric's door. What drew me to stand in that doorway and observe him while he fitfully tried to bury his head into his mattress, using his pillow to push his face further into the rumpled cotton sheets. I didn't think about it at the time, and truthfully I am not certain that that moment changed the course of my entire life. But something changed that day. Something between Eric and I shifted so imperceptibly, and yet so monumentally, that I was certain things would never be the same.

I tore my eyes away from Eric and surveyed his room with a gross fascination I never knew I even had in me. Of course I had been in the room, at one point it had been my office. I had spent long hours staring blankly at the walls, seeing nothing in particular, while I wracked my brain for words that were always just at the tip of my tongue. However, since Eric had moved in a couple months ago, I had scarcely seen the room. I knew Eric was clean, after all we shared common spaces, but I do not know if anything could have prepared me for just how organized Eric's room really was. Spartan would be an accurate term. There was his bed, several bookshelves, and a dresser, which stood alone in the opposite corner of the room with nothing atop it, not even a speck of dust.

I cautiously stepped foot into the room and then gingerly knocked on the door as I passed it, a complete after thought as I had already invaded his personal space uninvited. His face appeared from underneath the edge of the pillow and my heart nearly stopped as I examined the sad look upon his face.

"Hung over?" I asked casually, with a pathetic half smile that was meant to let him know I felt his pain. He lifted the one eyebrow I could see and regarded me as though he hadn't the slightest clue as to what I what I was talking about. I slowly approached his bed and uncertainly perched at the end of the bed. The whole room smelled of Eric, a combination of smoke and heady masculinity that I couldn't quite describe as anything. He smelled incredible, and it seems weird to admit this, but just his smell did the most unnerving things to me, sending my heart racing for no good reason at all.

"The way I hear it you may or may not have redecorated Tray and Amelia's bathroom." He groaned in that deep way of his and I struggled to maintain platonic indifference. What should it matter to me that every sound that escaped Eric resembled growls that couldn't help but send shivers down my spine? We were just friends, damn it. I was seeing Alcide. Sort of. Slow burn, slow burn, slow burn.

I thought for a moment, deciding where I should go from there, but then it was as if my body and mind detached and I was pulling Eric up and off the bed (well, kind of tugging uselessly at his arms until he acquiesced and pulled himself off the bed. Let's be honest, here, the chances that I would able to pull Eric anywhere are about one in one billion) and out towards the living room. He stood still, slightly stooped over, cradling his head with one hand as he rummaged through his pockets with the other.

Some time in between sitting on his bed and dragging him into the living room, I had decided so very unconsciously that I was going to play nursemaid and aid Eric in curing his hang over. For his part, he mostly stood around and grunted while I instructed him in the most gentle, yet stern voice I could muster up. I am not sure that he heard even a third of what he said, but there was effort there, I was certain, and he moved around me as I ran about in a frenzy collecting my things and ushering him out the door.

Twenty minutes later, we stood side by side, somewhat comically when you consider our gaping height difference, outside of the laundry mat. "Really?" he finally asked, and it seemed like the first thing he had said in hours. "This is what you thought would cure my hangover?" There was a bit of irritation in his voice, but also I could tell that he was amused.

He sucked hard on the cigarette that he held in a death grip between his first and middle finger. I was almost certain that the filter was nearly flat, but I didn't examine it to find out. I didn't want to get too close.

I wanted to point out that what he deemed my wasted efforts had magically brought him back to the land of the living, but I didn't want to chance derailing any of my progress so I let the comment go by without remark and pushed through the double doors of the building before us.

We were watching the clothes in the dryers that did not belong to us when I finally decided I had had enough silence. I had brought Eric along mostly for his own benefit. It was amazing what fresh air could do for a hang over, but also because I dreaded spending my time alone in a laundry mat. I could never get comfortable enough with all the strangers around me to relax and read a book and staring there at nothing, exactly like we were doing at this very moment usually unnerved people to the point where they seriously questioned your sanity.

"Alcide told me about the A and R guys." I broached the subject calmly, quietly. Yes, I was curious, but I wasn't trying to interrogate the man. He gave me a sidelong glance and didn't say anything for a moment, but eventually cleared his throat and mumbled what seemed like an admission of guilt. That really threw me for a loop, because as far as I could tell, Alcide had said it was nothing but positive and excitement abound.

"Shouldn't you be excited? I mean, that's big news for the band. You guys could finally break out from Lou's and really expose your music to a larger audience. You are really good…" I rambled on, my speech slowly fading as the somber expression on Eric's face remained firmly in place.

Our eyes met, with a lot of reluctance on my part, but he just stared woefully and I couldn't seem to break away. "They don't want the band," he finally said. I looked deep into his eyes and realized what he meant. They didn't want the band because they wanted him. Just him.

"Did you tell them?" I asked.

He shook his head. The admission was chock full of guilt and something else I couldn't quite put my finger on. Shame, maybe?

"You work real hard. You're a very talented musician." Even as the words left my mouth they felt like a horrific betrayal. "You—"

"No," he cut me off. I could heart the finality in his voice. The resignation. He had not even entertained the thought, and that knowledge filled me with an admiration for Eric that I had not known before. I let the topic fall away, not saying anything to fill the now thick silence between us.

"How was your date?" I heard him ask through the fog of my inner monologue.

"Fine." I answered, my voice just a little sharper than I had meant it to be. I didn't want to talk about Alcide with Eric. It was just too weird. Too complicated.

Whether he was having a particularly tactful moment or he didn't want to know more than that was anyone's guess, but he quickly dropped the subject. I rose from the uncomfortable wooden bench and began to pull my clothes from the dryer, Eric at my side performing the same motions with his own machine. For all the world it seemed as though Eric had done laundry countless times in his life. I was curious, but didn't ask. Like so many things with Eric it was just easier to assume than ask.

"Hungry?" I asked as I shut the door to the dryer.

"Starving."

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We made our way home in silence, his bag of freshly done laundry over his right shoulder and mine over his left. I hadn't asked, he'd just taken it upon himself.

"I feel like there is something we aren't saying," he mused in that wonderfully subdued, gruff way he always said things he was uncertain about.

I shrugged noncommittally as I unlocked our front door and went up the stairs in front of him. We had spent the rest of the day doing nothing but talking. Long, rambling conversations with no real purpose. Discussion about philosophies and music, the nuances of New Yorkers and inane tales of childhood adventures. All day Eric had seemed more serious than usual, just a little to the right of brooding. He had laughed, but it wasn't his usual loud bark, it was more a chuckle, almost fake, but not.

"If you could have any super power in the whole world," he had asked through a mouthful of fries, an act, which would normally prove repulsive, and a huge turnoff, but for him revealed an endearing charm, "What would it be?"

I thought this over carefully as I artfully slid the pickle from underneath from my hamburger bun and discarded it with a flick of my wrist. "I think maybe I would like to read people's minds. You know, telepathically or whatever. Hear their innermost thoughts."

He dipped a sad looking fry in the small packet of honey mustard situated equidistant from both of us (this distance had been carefully calculated by Eric after an argument of who would get the last pack) and popped it into his mouth with more grace than he had previously exhibited.

"No." His Adam's apple jumped high in his throat as he swallowed.

"No?"

"That is an awful power. You wouldn't want to read minds."

"So, what would you choose, smarty pants?"

I slid the honey mustard out of his reach as he went to dip another fry.

"Fuck you," he said with a laugh and I feigned shock before pulling it further towards me in playful defiance.

"Well?"

"I would fly." He spread his impressive arms out wide, stretching his imaginary wingspan, head tipped back and eyes closed. For a fleeting moment I truly believed Eric could fly if he so desired. The ripples of his triceps as he slowly rotated his arms out to catch the imaginary wind drew my eyes in towards his face and I was allowed to witness for once the pure beauty of Eric, totally unaware of the attention he was garnering from the female patrons, salivating at what was admittedly quite a sight. This was the Eric I saw when he on stage, not performing, but reveling in his own truths. That was what made Eric stand out from the rest. Yes, he was a showman, but it was more than that, when he played he bore his soul more for his own benefit than anyone else's. He grinned, full and wide at me, like he held all the answers to all the questions that had ever been asked and I felt the almost palpable shift of attention towards me.

"Like Superman?"

He shook his head and seemed almost embarrassed by what he was about to say. "Like a bird."

Back in the living room we collapsed on the couch, my small body barely making a dent compared to the way Eric nearly capsized the damn thing. He was fiddling with an unlit cigarette, obeying my wishes (for once) that he didn't smoke in the apartment. It made me nervous to watch him twiddle the tiny stick in his fingers like such a small baton.

We sat there, enjoying one another's company, and it felt as though the world—for that short afternoon—faded away. Have you ever experienced the bittersweet of a Sunday afternoon? When I was a child my brother and I would spend countless hours outside playing on Sunday, not coming in until Gran called us for our bath time. Back towards the house we would trudge, reliving the wonder of the day, but sad because the impending doom of Monday bearing down on our tiny little hearts. It felt much the same as an adult; only the impending doom wasn't Monday. It was the inevitability of reality; the moment when the world we lived in and the alternate universe we experienced today would collide leaving things shattered and messy.

As the day grew darker so did my mood. Try as I might to push it back into the far reaches of my mind, it hung there, ugly and unavoidable.

We had settled on watching Valley Girl, the choice being mostly mine with minimal complaint from Eric. His main argument was that Nicholas Cage sucked; those were his exact words. Nicholas Cage sucks. I thought you could look past him to enjoy the movie as a whole entity; Nicholas Cage was seriously the only bad thing about it.

The movie was winding down, approaching the final scene. It was all coming to a close, the movie, the night and unfortunately for us it wasn't going to end with a prom. Just before Josie Cotton was about to perform her big number, my phone, abandoned on the coffee table, began to vibrate. It was Alcide. I answered him softly and turned to Eric to see if we could pause just this last scene, but when I turned he was gone. The vacant spot on the couch barely even indented from the weight of his body. I smiled sadly to myself and turned the TV off as Alcide began telling me an amusing story about Dave, walking to my bedroom in the sudden, darkening stillness of the night.

Sunday was over.

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**Additional Author's Note: I want to thank you all for voicing your opinions about Eric's POV. Unfortunately, due to the tragic and untimely death of my computer it no longer exists. It will happen eventually, but now I have to write it again. My advice now is backup your computers. You have no idea how much music I lost. And pictures. And stories. I wept like a child gripping my computer. It was pathetic.**

**Thank you for reading.  
**


	13. Variations on a Theme

**As I write this Author's Note my dog is on the floor next to me, sitting down, leaning his forehead against the wall…fast asleep. I'm about to sleep myself, albeit in a more comfortable position, but I wanted to post this first.**

**I cannot thank everyone enough for the kind words, the enthusiasm and support and really just the time you all take to read every chapter. I hope you are all still on this journey despite the massively slow updating. **

**There's a playlist for this story on my profile. (blush). I stole the idea from someone else (I don't remember who, I swear I would give you credit if I could remember), but music is always playing when I write and when I imagine the world of my characters and I wanted to share another aspect of this story with you. Feel free to ignore it, but it's there if you like that type of thing. **

**Lastly, shit..this is going on forever, I wanted to thank **slcurwin** and **noto94** for performing emergency beta duties for me. I am eternally grateful. I don't own anything. **

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Chapter Thirteen: Variations on a Theme

The thing with time is that it just keeps going. It is in the silence of songs, the changing of the season; it is an all-consuming force that propels us forward. Whether you ignore it with complete indifference or vigilantly mark it off with thick black x's on a calendar, it just keeps going. Time does not care if you mind it. It cannot be coerced or controlled. You may wish it to go faster or will it to slow down, but time will just keep going. It will march on into infinity without sparing you a second glance. And why? Because time doesn't give a shit about you, about what you want to accomplish, or whether or not you've been awake for the past twenty nine hours. Time has its own agenda; we are all subject to its constancy. And long after we are gone, time will keep going.

I wasn't marking time, and while I was too busy to notice its steady progression the spring turned into summer, and then late summer, and then the end of July brought my birthday with it. Amidst the worst summer the city had seen in years, I too moved on into the next chapter of my life. The unrelenting heat bore down on the city, suffocating its inhabitants and cloaking the already choked city air with a cloud of humidity that wouldn't seem to break.

Long gone were my freelance days, not to mention the lazy, haphazard existence that came along with it. Several weeks earlier I had been offered a permanent staffing position at _Sheer_, complete with my very own cubicle and a mug that sat on the edge of my desk that was meant for coffee, but let's be honest, the coffee in the office was so horrific I wasn't about to go anywhere near it. I was now part of the nine to five and though I sometimes missed those long, meandering days that I spent writing what I wanted when I wanted, I felt like for the first time in so long as I could remember I was thriving on the challenges of day to day life.

And then there was Alcide, who I had been seeing. While it wasn't quite filled with unbridled passion and fevered moments worthy of Madonna and Sean Penn like fights, it was real. Alcide was perfect on paper. Showing up when he said he would, treating me with respect and tenderness. No, my body didn't quiver from his touch, and I didn't long for him when he wasn't near, but those were all things I chalked up to inane obsession that usually accompanies lust. What we had was solid, a friendship first and foremost.

I would be lying if I said it didn't worry me that I didn't feel intense love. But mostly it was in the night, in the deafeningly quiet confines of my darkened room as Alcide moved with such intense determination above me that I felt something was missing. But those were things I pushed down deep within myself where I wouldn't have to confront them. To a place that welled with loneliness, and at times it felt as though it were suffocating me slowly from the inside out.

It was on the day before my birthday that I was walking down 7th and cursing my decision to wear the admittedly beautiful, but criminally uncomfortable shoes that Pam had bought me as an early present. Each jarring step I took down the uneven concrete produced sharp pains that felt like exclamation points on the bad idea that was these shoes. The ick factor of walking down city streets barefoot was waning with each block I went and by the time I reached my street I was just about set to fling my heels into the middle of the street, abandoning them for whom ever came along first. The thought had occurred to me that I could have taken a cab, but, oh, that would have made sense.

That night we were all heading out to dinner to celebrate my birthday. We were all meeting at a tiny place Amelia had chosen for us. When I had called Amelia the week before on her land line Tray had picked up the phone and whispered hurriedly that it could barely fit us all comfortably in the building, let alone at one table, but the food was good and the drinks were cheap. I, of course, had no idea where we were going, but Pam and Alcide had both assured me I was guaranteed to like the dinner.

I have never been terribly fond of my birthday, but this year I was determined not to ruin anyone else's fun with my pessimistic outlook. It just always seemed to me that you make all these expectations of your birthday, wanting to feel special or noticed and when that inevitably fell apart there was nothing left but disappointment. Strangely enough this theory coincided nicely with my overall view of the world.

Amelia had been the one to propose a "family" dinner and the excitement with which she had approached me had prevented me from turning her down. I was trying really to focus more on the fact that I would be spending the night with my friends and, of course, Alcide, rather than my imminent walk towards death. I had been having what some may describe as a quarter life crisis, mourning with great intensity my lack of accomplishments professionally and otherwise. It was as though my recent accomplishments suddenly put everything else into perspective. Besides the editor I was the oldest person at the magazine and every pseudo celebrity and model I interviewed was younger than the next.

One Friday night at Lou's following one too many beers and not enough food I had voiced this concern. "I'm just saying, the middle of my life is fast approaching and what tangible proof do I have that I have done anything but dick around since college? You should see some of the children I have interviewed, barely out of diapers and already making millions. It's upsetting."

"I think technically you are past the allotted age for a quarter life crisis, there, Sook," Dave had so helpfully pointed out.

I was about to respond when Pam beat me to it. "You can technically go fuck yourself, David." And yet his comment resonated within my head, only further depressing me. Not only had I missed the boat on getting shit done, I was now too old to even be upset about the fact that I've done nothing with my life.

As I made the seemingly endless walk down my street I tried to focus on taking small steps. I could see Eric in the distance, hunched over and knees bent, cigarette in one hand and a book in the other. He wore the most ridiculously ugly sunglasses and a t-shirt that hugged his bulging biceps as they flexed to bring his cigarette to his mouth. Eric had become an increasingly considerate version of his former self, often taking his cigarettes outside where once he would only attempt to crack a window even though I was constantly on him about smoking indoors.

"I'm trying to quit," he said with a sheepish smirk even before he acknowledged my presence and scooted over just a fraction of an inch across the step so as to allow me a seat. That had become his mantra. Any time he even thought of smoking the words tumbled from his mouth. Earnest intentions, however, had not cut back his intake.

He leaned back on the step, his left hand coming up to rub his stomach as if settling an ache, his large fingers stretched across the soft gray cotton, bringing his shirt up slightly to reveal the very toned, slightly fair skin on his stomach.

"What are you doing out here? Contemplating the mysterious unknowns?" I asked teasingly as I took my place beside him. The humidity was oppressive and I was sweating, quite unattractively, and as a direct result was feeling less than sexy. It goes without saying that I was trying to keep some semblance of distance from Eric so that I would decrease the possibility of disgusting him, but the small distance I left between us only served to encourage him to invade the available space.

"Oh, you know, the usual. Why is the sky blue, why is the earth round, why did that chicken cross the road."

"How many licks does it take to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop?" I chimed in helpfully.

"Nah," he said, shaking his head and turning to look at me with a smirk. "I've already figured that one out."

"Did you now?" I waited a few moments for him to respond, but he only continued to smile that same shit eating grin and stared at me. "Are you gonna tell me?" I prompted.

"It's more of a show than a tell," he lazily concluded with a suggestive wiggle of his brow.

"Don't be gross," I pushed lightly against his shoulder, but instead of pulling away he put his arm around me and pulled me in closer. The heat I was experiencing as a single entity was excruciating, when Eric put his arm around me the added heat from his body was maddening. And yet, I didn't pull away. I allowed him to hold me there, the heat from our bodies mingling as we sat side by side staring off into the street.

"Happy Birthday," he all but whispered into my ear. The deep woodsy smell that was uniquely Eric filled my senses and I breathed deeply, not at all minding the scent of cigarette smoke as it blended with his own, allowing his stubbly cheek to rub against my neck before I pulled away to face him.

"It isn't until tomorrow."

"Happy almost birthday," he amended with a smile in his voice

Eric and I had evolved into a bizarre friendship, somewhere between love and hate. It was Eric I came home to every night, Eric who I ate dinner with and with whom I spent lazy Saturday mornings drinking coffee and discussing the more mundane aspects of life. We avoided anything too personal, like his love life or my own. Much in the same way that he avoided Alcide and I. Since Dave had seemed to take up permanent residence on Alcide's couch and he didn't have the heart to kick him out, the only choice we had was to spend our evenings at my place. Almost immediately before Alcide would arrive Eric would disappear without a word, making himself scarce until the next morning when he would appear and act as though nothing had happened. It was awkward, but selfishly I was glad he stayed away. It was just easier that way.

Summer in the city is an animal all its own. It is as though the heat has a sound, a tangible energy that pervades all aspects of life until we are embroiled in this alternative summer world. It is so loud, resounding even and yet at the same time it is still, so much so you feel as though you might scream. The stoop felt like the center of the universe as far as I was concerned at that very moment and I slowly slid my aching feet out of the traitorous pumps. I leaned back, aligning my body with Eric's, though a smaller, shorter repose by far.

Out of the corner of my eye I watched as he inhaled a final drag and flipped the butt into the street with a practiced expertise, a complicate maneuver that launched it from between his thumb and middle finger.

"Digging the hair, Stackhouse." I had left work with a perfect blow out courtesy of the fashion editor, Lafayette, who had abused my hair all day long in order to write an article about the wonders of a current trendy hair product. It had cut a hole into my productivity for the day, but I stepped out of work looking great. That was until I made it to the subway and the choice became risking heat stroke from my hair or putting it in a ponytail.

He gave a strong tug at the end of my ponytail and my body responded to the action, though I refrained from commenting. When I failed to answer he took to twirling his fingers in the bottom of my very long, very straight ponytail, tugging lightly every so often, jolting lust through my body and self -loathing through my mind for even allowing him to affect me in this way.

My phone vibrated in my hand just as Eric was inspecting my straight locks with laughably over exaggerated hesitancy, poking and prodding about my head, trying to elicit some kind of response from me. "Stop," I demanded with a chuckle as I swatted away his hand and answered my phone. He mock surrendered, placing both hands in the air, and leaned back once again to resume his position.

"Happy Birthday, my dear." My Gran's soothing voice filled the air around me. It was easy to ignore the dull notion of homesickness that I sometimes felt if I merely didn't think of it, but hearing my Gran's voice filled me with a longing for the south and her cooking and the feeling of her arms wrapped around me in the kind of comforting hug that only Gran could provide.

I got up from the step and went inside silently, all the while savoring my Gran's theatrics as she told me all about my nephew and my brother and the life back home that I worked so hard not to think about. I did note, though, that Eric silently accompanied me the entire way, holding doors and unlocking others, making the way for me without having to be asked as we moved in unspoken sync through the spaces we shared.

* * *

Twenty seven was starting out as a bad year for me. This was made exponentially more disconcerting by the fact that I would not be turning twenty seven for another six hours. The call from my Gran had left me sad, sadder than maybe I had any right to be. I was still young, goddamn it, but Ryan Adams said it best—to be young is to be sad, right? I remember the song mentioning something about being high, but I felt too depressingly old to even bother.

I had made my way to the mirror to get ready to go out and started to look just a bit too closely at my reflection. The slight bagging under my eyes that I could have sworn wasn't there that morning, the gentle downturn of my lips stretching just a bit further than the edges of my mouth. There was undeniable proof that it wasn't all in my head, I was aging much more quickly than I had ever anticipated. Three years to thirty. T minus three. It was a countdown to God knows what, but it was bearing down on me like a freight train. I had counted twelve grey hairs and three new frown lines by the time Eric found me standing in front of my full length mirror having a full on meltdown.

I didn't turn to look at him, but in my periphery I could see him stroll confidently through my bedroom, a guitar slung across his body. Before he reached my side, Eric began crooning my name in an impossibly high falsetto.

"Susannah. What do you wanna do?" The forced rhyme was followed by several chords that had no business being together and then a full on Nirvana worthy jam session. If I hadn't been on the verge of a nervous breakdown it would have made me laugh. Had I turned to face him I knew I would find there a smile that Eric reserved only for me, goofy and unabashed. The thought of that smile was even too much and I laughed loudly despite my struggle to continue to wallow in self-pity.

He must have caught the expression on my face, though, because within seconds his demeanor changed drastically.

"I thought we were happy. What happened?" He tossed his guitar onto my bed, with much less care than he usually reserved for his instrument and cautiously approached me and stood behind me as I continued to stare at myself in the mirror. I tore my eyes away from my own reflection long enough to meet his gaze in the mirror high above my own. The soft, concerned look that distorted his features made me feel even worse than when I had been alone and I nearly burst into tears when I confessed what was bothering me.

"I'm getting old," I practically wept without turning or moving, but rather stood still staring into his ever compassionate eyes as I lost it right in front of him. It was probably a good thing that I had written off ever potentially sleeping with Eric Northman a long time ago, because as the days passed and he realized just how much of a fucking basket case I really was, I was increasingly aware of the slimming chance he would ever be attracted to me.

It wasn't just that I thought I was getting old, but that time was moving on and there was nothing to be done about it. My Gran had sounded more fragile than I had ever heard her sound, her words just a little more drawn that I remembered. Every holiday I didn't return home, every birthday that passed without a visit was just more time I couldn't ever get back.

I swallowed the nonspecific lump of sentiment that rose in my throat as Eric placed his hands firmly on my shoulders and rested his chin upon my head as he stared at our reflections, the deep lines of his face still etched with concern, though his mouth twisted in up amusement. It was both patronizing and empathetic. His large palms began gently smoothing down my hair, easing down my arms until they found my body and then his arms encircled themselves around me swallowing me whole in his embrace. We stood there a few moments studying our own reflections.

It then occurred to me how often I avoided looking at Eric, just simply bypassing the act of really acknowledging his presence in favor of the general idea that he existed in the world alongside me. Strange how you can spend so much time with a person and never truly see them.

"You are perfect."

My eyes shot up to meet his at the slightly muffled words that I was certain I had misheard. Searching his eyes for something, anything at all that would tell me the man saying those words was the insincere asshole version of my friend. Anything that would allow me to write it off as nothing more than flirting, but everything in his gaze told me I was wrong. Everything that gathered at the pit of my stomach, clenching in anticipation of what his eyes promised to me, urged me not to shrug this off. Yet everything in my rationale knew that men like Eric, that Eric, only caused pain, and that he could never deliver on those promises. So with a tight smile and a firm pat on his hands that rested on my stomach so lightly it felt as though they had intimate knowledge of my body, I twisted away from him and the feelings he was evoking in me.

Where a normal person with any possession of self would ignore the tension, allow it dissipate naturally without drawing attention to it, my spastic self immediately launched into a nervous diatribe about hormones and birthdays while a slightly confused but very compliant Eric followed behind.

About the time we began walking down the street I had gotten my shit together enough to shut up and I found that I was almost able to enjoy the humidity now that the hot afternoon sun had given way to the cool, darkening evening sky. The sadness I had been feeling before was now just a vague notion I had pushed to the back of my mind, the contented place it always resided, nestled between homesick and heartsick where I didn't bother to look unless absolutely necessary. Denial is an all-purpose defense mechanism.

"Can I ask you a question?" Eric's calm voice shook me from my thoughts.

"Depends, what's the question?" Why am I crazy? What is wrong with me? Why does that look in your eyes make me feel things I absolutely should not be feeling when I am seeing your friend? None of which I say out loud.

"You miss your Gran."

"Yes." I agreed quietly. I hadn't voiced that particular concern to Eric and it surprised me that he had paid such close attention to me.

"Why don't you just go home and visit?" He didn't look back at me as he asked this, but rather stepped towards the edge of the curb and held his long arm up into the air, signaling to a cab. I resisted answering until we were both seated in the back and Eric mumbled our destination to the driver.

"I miss my Gran very much and I would love to go home and see her, but unfortunately that costs a great deal of money. Before I couldn't afford it and now that I can, I can't take time off from work. I know you might not know anything about being poor but some of us can't just do whatever, whenever. We have to work for it." It was perhaps a bit too harsh, and honestly I hadn't meant it as bitterly as it had come out. I instantly regretted it when Eric's face turned to watch something unknown outside of the cab, he features cool and closed off. I could have apologized, but I didn't. We looked out our respective windows at the city passing us by, each lost in our minds.

"Yes, Sookie, I do have money. But at what price?" His voice was solemn, grieved, as he continued to stare out the window. I didn't say anything, I hardly breathed in those few moments. "I would gladly give it all back if for one moment I was no longer alone in this world."

His words hung in the air and all I could think to do was slide my hand across the questionably clean surface of the backseat of that taxi and grab a hold of Eric's hand. I traced the side of his thumb with my fingertips, silently urging him to turn his hand over and surrender to me. Inch by inch, finger by finger, I slowly curled his hand over until it lay prone, exposing itself to me and I very carefully threaded my fingers through Eric's, anchoring myself to him.

"You aren't alone." The words escaped me scratchy and unsteady. It was enough, though, because after a moment's hesitation Eric's fingers wrapped themselves around the whole of my hand, palms pressed together, fingers strained in an almost desperate death grip. In a way, I guess we were holding on for our lives.

The cab driver pulled over and when I looked up I saw that we were at Bob's, only it didn't like look it normally did. The entire front window seemed almost ablaze with the warm glow of candle light coming from inside. Eric led me from the car to the door, ushered me in, our hands still conspicuously clasped together. As our friends began swarming around, each vying for a hug, our hands gradually drifted apart and when his forefinger fell from my grasp, a motion that probably went unnoticed by the whole of that room surrounding the two of us, that black hole of loneliness surrounding my heart seized up and for the briefest moment I would swear to you now that I felt my heart completely stop.

"Oh, Amelia, you shouldn't have," I whispered to her when she came close enough for me to grasp her in a fierce hug. "It's wonderful."

"It was nothing," she replied as she pulled back and gave an exaggerated flip of her hair over her shoulder.

"She's lying," Tray boomed as he enveloped me in a hug so tight that my feet left the floor, immediately handing me over to Dave who continued to squeeze me until I couldn't breathe. "She's been agonizing over this for weeks," Tray continued as I found myself in Pam's arms, being introduced to a man who I had never met before, her latest fling I assumed, whose name I learned was Stan before he too was hugging me and wishing me a happy birthday.

"It's wonderful. Everyone, thank you so much," I shouted to everyone as the crowd began to separate, each going to a seat with a charming little name tag placed in front of it.

"Shit, Amelia, this is some serious dinner."

"She has been watching way too much Martha Stewart," Pam snickered as she pointed at my name tag and Alcide sitting beside my intended seat.

"Leave Martha alone!" I heard as I bent down to greet Alcide with a kiss.

"Hey, mister," I mumbled against the tickling hair of his beard and nuzzled against it a bit before taking a seat beside him. And just like that the weird feelings that had been following me all day seemed to just fall away in the few minutes it took me to get from the door to the table.

Dinner was a multi course affair, with everyone eating and laughing, toasting any occasion that seemed appropriate in the moment and generally enjoying the pleasure of the company. I managed to duck to the ladies room when the boys busted out a particularly large round of Irish car bombs. Where they came from I was not quite sure, but after the first one I knew another round wasn't in the cards for me. As I walked through the door I realized Pam and Amelia were on my heels. Amelia had been abstaining from alcohol all night, due in part to what I assumed was some misguided Miss Manners proper hostess etiquette, Pam a little (a lot) drunker and therefore a bit more wobbly than Amelia nearly smacked her face against the door as they trailed behind.

"Field trip or…?" I called over my shoulder, letting my question fall off as I headed into a stall.

"I need to talk to you guys," came Amelia's answer.

Then I heard Pam hesitantly question, "I thought we were coming in here to talk shit about Dave's date." Dave's date was Arlene, a bony redhead whose personality was as fake as her hair color. During the times she wasn't busy ignoring all of us, she was falling over herself to impress anyone who would listen to her with tales of her amazing career as a model. "Hand model, maybe," I had grumbled to Alcide uncharitably when she announced her profession.

"Why would you think that?" Amelia asked, genuine confusion evident in her tone.

"You gave me the 'let's go talk shit about Dave's girlfriend' face."

Amelia scoffed. "It was really more like 'we're going to the bathroom, come along because I want to talk to you' face."

I approached the sink and began washing my hands as they continued to hash out what exactly the face was that Amelia gave Pam.

"It doesn't matter. I would really rather talk shit about Dave's date. Sookie, what did you think?"

"I think she's probably really hungry and that's why she has such a bad attitude," I answered with mock concern while I dried my hands. "Besides, who gives a shit about her. Who is this Stan person and where have you been hiding him?"

"We met last weekend, but I don't know…"

I cut her off, realizing with the rush of my words that I was probably a little more tipsy than I had given myself credit for. "I know. Trust me, I know. He's like…he's like…" I was still searching for words to fully appreciate Pam's new man when Amelia cut us both off.

"You guys, seriously." Amelia sighed heavily and took in a sharp breath, holding it there. "I'm pregnant."

Pam and I began screaming and flung ourselves around poor Amelia who was nearly knocked over in our enthusiastic embrace. It was hardly an opportune setting for such an occasion, but that didn't matter as we held each other close and shouted out congratulations, tangled together in a giant group hug, gripping one another with such sincerity there might be bruising.

"Wait, wait," Amelia interrupted our shouts of joy with a stern voice. "You have to promise to keep it a secret. I wasn't even supposed to be telling you, but, you guys, I really thought I was going to bust if I didn't say something."

"How far along are you?" I asked.

"Almost nine weeks. Baby is little more than back pains and nausea right now, but I'm delirious with joy and you wouldn't believe how excited Tray is. He is just practically running around glowing. You would think he's the pregnant one."

Motherhood could never have happened to a better woman. Amelia was going to be such an excellent mother, even if just based on the way that she took care of all of us. I hugged her once more as we left the bathroom and we did our best to compose ourselves, chalking up the screaming to a bug in the bathroom.

I tucked myself under Alcide's arm, falling into the debate over whether or not Kurt Cobain really contributed anything to music. As the night wore one and the drinks kept flowing I let my eyes find Eric sitting across the table, deep in a conversation with Stan and Dave. His hands moved animatedly as he told a story about a rabid fan that had attacked him one night on the street—I knew the story well and it brought a smile to my face. Suddenly, as though he had sensed my amusement amidst the din of the evening, he turned to face me, a questioning look on his face.

That table separating us may as well have been a country for as distant as I felt right at that moment. Standing at opposite ends of a chasm, each positioned at the edge but unable to move forward. The shift of Alcide's arm around my shoulders drew me back to the present and I broke the odd stare down, though I was still able to feel the weight of Eric's eyes upon me long after I stopped looking.

A faint light entered my line of vision. It was Amelia, illuminated by the glow of a single candle atop a modest cake. She placed it gingerly on the table before me and I admired it while my friends, musically inclined or not, sang out to me in a cacophony of voices.

I always hated the phrase, the one about having cake and not being able to eat it. It just never made sense, really, but as I closed my eyes tightly to make a wish upon my lone birthday candle I thought of that stupid fucking phrase and it all made sense. To have something is only half the experience. In order to truly enjoy something you have to commit to all aspects of it. And so with the deepest breathe I could pull into my lungs I blew out that candle and all thoughts of Eric.

* * *

**A/N: Does anyone want to have a conversation with me about my preoccupation with hand holding? I apologize. Truly, I do. I can explain it in great detail if you are curious what the hell my problem is. **


	14. Our Hearts are Wrong

**Author's Note: Thank you to **krtmd**. She makes everything so much beta. (Sorry, I know that was lame). I began this over a year ago, I know it's slow going sometimes and I'm sorry for that, but I love to read all of your reviews so much. So thank you for that. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of this, really. Nor do I own the title...it belongs to Jessica Lea Mayfield.**

* * *

Chapter Fourteen: Our Hearts are Wrong

Possibly the only thing worse than the raging heat and stifling humidity of July was the wretched, never ending Indian summer that descended upon the city in early September. True to my word, I had begun to forget all about Eric Northman, or better, he had forgotten all about me. Either way, we had gone from friends, or friends-ish, and roommates to strangers who sometimes greeted each other on the odd late morning or slow Tuesday night. That space between us—it grew and grew. And I, in turn, grew numb to that distance until I barely even noticed it at all.

I had committed myself to Alcide and making things work, but also to not torturing myself with the maybes and what-ifs of my life. I was learning to live in the present one day at a time. Really, life couldn't have been any better. Work was hectic at best and the magazine was beginning to create quite a sensation. So much so that I was logging a lot of mandatory overtime—showing face about town at galas and parties, kissing ass and schmoozing it up. Octavia had become power hungry from all of the attention we were receiving. _Sheer_ had become the _it_ place to see and be seen. I attended fashion week, promotional parties and drank more complimentary glasses of champagne than I ever knew my life would contain. I had begun to think of it as a professionally motivated social life.

Standing by my side at these functions was Alcide. You wouldn't know it to look at him, but he was a big hit with this crowd. Of course, Alcide was undeniably handsome, rugged and aggressive to the naked eye, but when he opened his mouth Alcide exuded confidence and incredibly sexy intelligence that enraptured the men and women at these parties as he would casually weave things like Kierkegaard into conversation. He was growing to be one of my best friends, a confidant and a sidekick. It still wasn't the height of romance, but we took excellent care of each other. We had things like consideration and communication, things I had always lacked in my previous relationships.

Despite that, though, the lost feeling in the pit of my stomach still ate away at me when everything was quiet. When there was no one around it was as though my body was speaking to me, trying to push through itself to reveal my truths. I would lay so still some nights when this would happen, observing how strong the pulsing of a vein was inside my neck felt, the painful rushing of blood through my veins with swift purpose, flooding my heart to open and close, open and close.

I often wonder if science has ruined us for love. Hundreds of years ago love was believed to be a mystical force that twined two people together; a hundred years ago people still believed in romance. Science has reduced us all to a complex equation of organs and chemicals that are predetermined to fulfill biological roles because our chromosomes have come together in such a way. It has robbed us of mystery. Before there was science, there was magic and love, and now in its place only algorithms to calculate compatibility and financial profiles. Love is no longer something that happens to you, it is a decision that is reached with a rational examination of what another person can do for you. Science has brought with it much sadness.

And yet.

Knowing all this, I cannot help but think it is my stubborn self that has so thoroughly grabbed onto this idea of love as illusion that I can't see past it. I have so decidedly deemed love a thing of the past that I cannot even begin to acknowledge the possibility of its existence. Love is Santa Claus in the fucked up world that is Sookie. Other people (read: normal, non-crazy, obsessive, neurotic people) allow themselves to believe in that ancient mystic notion of love and only I deny it until my heart burns and my head aches.

It wasn't all of a sudden that I realized Alcide and I weren't meant for each other. No, it was slowly. As time passed I felt my feelings for him stay the same. Not grow or wane, just remain perfectly as they were. Affection was there, without a doubt, but the niggling feeling over my shoulder that I felt every time I turned around was growing harder and harder to ignore. In the loneliness that I still felt beside him, that unnamed sorrow that weighed so heavy on my heart that I felt it physically titled my body to one side. It became all too clear that the problem wasn't my loneliness but something much deeper than that, something much more real. This wasn't something that could be filled by another person, it was a void within myself that I knew only I could fill.

I thought often of my parents in those weeks, my Gran and my childhood. I had felt so loved growing up, and yes, the death of my parents at such an early age was a great loss, but I had been carried through it. The older I got, the further away I got from that love, the clearer it was becoming to me that I never truly allowed myself to feel a great many things that I should have felt. The loss wasn't something to ignore and pretend wasn't there within me, I needed to embrace that hardship and allow it to better inform who I was becoming.

Life was no longer some destination I was running towards, it was here and full blown and in the midst of it all I realized that, while I liked having a hand to hold, I perhaps needed to stand in the middle of the life that I had cultivated for myself by myself. I needed to figure out how I fit into everything. And I needed to do it alone.

Easier said than done, though. The conclusion I had reached was a little more complicated in execution than in theory, but it was becoming increasingly evident I was going to have to man up and end things. It was on my mind constantly and I danced around it for several days before a decision was made for me. I would've broken up with Alcide precisely because I did love him, because it wasn't the right kind of love, because deep down it was what would be best for the both of us.

I would have told him all this, only, he beat me to it.

It was five days into a particularly cruel heat wave. Late at night we lay on my bed, the city sounding in on our thoughts as we lay disheveled in near darkness, the light from the city street flooding a single corner of the room, our bodies not quite touching under the thin cotton sheet. The noise, something I usually found enchanting about the city, was oppressive. It was Alcide, and my own stupid fears, and the rising temperature and the bum on the corner screaming about tin foil. It was everything in the air.

"I need to talk to you." Alcide's gruff voice sounded unsure, hesitant. I hummed in acknowledgement and rolled my body slightly towards him, careful not to pull the sheets. It was humid, much too humid to be getting up in his face, so I merely stared at the light cast against the far wall as I waited for him to continue.

"I saw Debbie yesterday." Ah, the ex-girlfriend we never discussed. Not that I spouted endlessly about my former flames, but Debbie, to the best of my knowledge, was a significant ex. If I had had such an affair to speak of I certainly would have, but Alcide rarely mentioned Debbie and if he did it was only in passing.

"Did something happen?" I asked when he failed to elaborate.

He didn't answer, though I wasn't worried that he had cheated on me. He knew my history, knew all about Quinn, and even if we weren't destined forever, Alcide was an honorable man. Suddenly, I was worried for Alcide and it didn't matter that it was ninety eight percent humidity in the stifling closet that was my room; I reached over and placed a hand over his shoulder, traveling the lines of his tattoos with soothing strokes.

"No, nothing happened. But—Jesus, seeing her again. I remembered what it was like to feel that way about a person, so intense and all consuming."

A horn sounded in the street below and the bum was off on another tangent and all I could do was hold my breath because I knew exactly what was coming. I knew what was coming because it was everything I was too chicken shit to say myself.

"I love you, Sookie, I do. But. But not like that. And it isn't fair. It isn't fair to either of us to settle for anything less."

My heart hurt for Alcide. "Did you talk to her?" I slid my body over and laid my head on his bare chest, feeling the pounding of his heart against my temple and the warmth of his skin under my fingertips. He buried his face in my hair and though he didn't say anything I could feel him shake his head against mine. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I can't." He mumbled after a few moments, but his arms wound around my back and pulled my body to his.

"So, this is it then, huh?"

"I think it should be."

"Would you hate me if I asked if we could still be friends?"

He gave a low chuckle and squeezed me tightly. "You will always be my friend, Sookie."

"We are so fucked up. You do realize that, right?" I nudged him playfully, yet despite the smile I put on my face I was still hurt. Not so much by Alcide, we both knew this was coming, but that didn't make it suck less.

"I think—" he started, but faltered, letting the thought drop off. "I think if. If we were in a different situation you would be exactly the kind of person I could love. I could love you."

"I could love you, too."

Breaths were leaving him in calm, continuous waves. Our bodies pressed together despite the humidity. We both needed to feel each other right now. Strange how breaking up could bring us so close together. The loneliness that had once felt so palatable to me now felt a little less. Sometimes there is nothing more comforting than not being alone in your loneliness.

And sometimes that is just the ugly reality of things. Sometimes things just suck and even if you rip the band aid off really fast it is still going to hurt like hell. And sometimes you cannot convince yourself you love someone no matter how much either one of you wants to believe it. Alcide and I had much more in common than we thought, we both wanted to love and to be loved, and we both had shit taste in significant others.

...

I woke up unusually early the next morning and though the news had predicted the heat wave would stretch well into the next week it was unseasonably cool, as though the world had once again found balance. I was lying on my bed, struggling into a pair of stretch cords when I heard the apartment door open and close. I didn't think much of it and finished getting dressed. When I left my room for breakfast there was no one in sight. Eric's door was closed tight and there was a fresh pot of coffee. I knew it wasn't Alcide, he had left shortly after we had agreed it was best if we broke up. I wondered idly where Eric had been all night, or if he had just gone for a run and I hadn't heard him come home last night. I didn't dwell on it though. I ate a quick breakfast of dry toast and left the apartment with a new bounce in my step. The sun shining on my back, the wind blowing through the trees. It felt as though everything would be okay today. And okay, for me, felt like a monumental achievement.

That evening I was sitting in Amelia's kitchen helping her prepare dinner. It was Friday, the band was playing their usual gig at Lou's and Pam was due over at any minute. Perched upon a stool at the island in her kitchen, my bare feet curled around the bottom rung, I rolled my arches back and forth to give myself a much deserved massage.

"Stop doing that," Amelia chastised as she filled a pot with water in the sink. "And you're okay with everything?" She was referring to Alcide and I. I had just laid it all out for her in excruciating detail. The water in the pot sloshed dangerously high up on the sides as she walked it back over to the stove.

"Ugh, enough about me. It is so depressing," I moaned as I cracked the end off another green bean and tossed it into the bowl she had placed before me. "Let's talk about you. What are you and Tray hoping for?" She was about four months along, her stomach protruding just slightly. Things had begun to become very exciting now that we were allowed to know she was pregnant. That isn't to say we weren't aware before, but given that we were all sworn to secrecy, it was a little like that episode of _Friends_ when Rachel and Phoebe find out that Monica and Chandler are sleeping together with all the 'do you know what I think you know that I already know?' As a group we should probably never be entrusted with government secrets.

She crossed her fingers and raised them skyward as she closed her eyes. "A baby, God willing." Then she uncrossed her fingers and shook her fists in the air.

"Smartass," I muttered, but smiled despite her cheeky answer and tossed another green bean into the bowl.

She laughed her light, tinkling laugh and pulled the oven door down, pushing pans this way and that until she had arranged everything to her liking. Amelia was like a slightly more subversive Julia Child.

"Will you come with me to this stupid thing?" I all but whined as she began stirring something that resembled chocolate pudding but smelled more like chili. Usually unidentifiable food terrified me, but I had utter trust in Amelia. If she wanted to cook me anything I had no doubt it would taste excellent, even if it contained little chopped off bunny feet. Though I would prefer it didn't.

"When is it?" The stupid thing, as I had referred to it, was a performance by a musician who went by the ominous single name Isabelle. I assumed she had a last name somewhere, but I was intrigued maybe more than I wanted to admit by the very Madonnaesque nature of dropping the surname in favor of mystery. She had asked distractedly, still intently focused on moving various dishes about, and I paused thoughtfully before answering her to silently do the math in my head.

"I have no idea. My God, aren't you just at my beck and call for whatever, whenever?" I gave an exaggerated sigh and began laughing. I can never keep a straight face. "It's like two weeks from Wednesday," I amended, though I was still counting off days on my outstretched fingers.

"I can't. And kinda don't want to what with being pregnant and all that. What about Pam?" The assignment in question included actually watching her perform and as I had recently lost my built in date for all work and non-work functions I was looking at a sad, long and lonely night by myself.

"It is next to impossible for Pam to make plans that far in advance," I responded, hoping the dejection was rolling off me in waves, and snapped the end off the last bean before shoving the bowl towards her across the island.

"We made arrangements to have dinner three weeks before hand and she managed just fine." Amelia punctuated this point with a stab of her slotted spoon into the air of my general direction.

I huffed like a teenager and walked around the island to the counter where freshly scrubbed potatoes were sitting in a pile. Scooping a few off the counter into my arms, I snatched a peeler from the drawer and reclaimed my stool.

"You aren't even that pregnant."

A snort escaped her nose. "Eff you. You try being tired all the time and fat and gross and nauseated and then you tell me just how pregnant you feel."

"I'm being replaced," I feigned despair as I scraped the last strip of skin from a potato with vigor.

"I could never replace you," she said with a smile and a hand placed firmly on her abdomen. The buzzer sounded clear through the room at that exact moment. "Hold that thought."

Moments later Amelia reentered the kitchen with Pam in tow. Her purse slung around her arm, her phone and coffee gripped in one hand, a large white pastry box balanced atop her other, held out straight waitress style.

"What did you bring us?" I asked in lieu of a proper greeting. Amelia snickered on her way over to the oven and Pam slapped the box onto the counter, shoving it towards me with a flick of her wrist.

"I baked." She pulled her sunglasses off and deposited them on the island with the rest of her belongings, taking the seat opposite mine. My fingers hovered over the box, wiggling with anticipation. "Jesus, just open it." I laughed and pried the tape from the box, lifting the top gingerly and easing it back.

Inside was a pecan pie. What Pam had given me wasn't just a pie, though. She was bringing me comfort, a little piece of home.

"You get one."

I closed the top and gave her a significant look. There was no way I could express in words how truly I appreciated the gesture. And without acknowledging what had just happened we resumed business as normal.

"Alright, bitches, when is dinner going to be ready because I am starving.

...

"Oh. Oh, the clothes." Pam cried as she grabbed her side of the table and practically hauled herself off the side as she continued to laugh uncontrollably. We had finished our dinner and were sitting around the kitchen table and somehow the conversation had taken a turn towards exes, mine in particular, despite Pam's quantity over my quality. "He was such a loser," she continued to lament through her tears of laughter. "He was just so—"

"Nice," I finished for her before she got the chance to complete her thought. "He was nice."

"Boring," she concluded with a laugh.

Amelia, ever the mother, pinched Pam sharply on the elbow before leaning back into her chair getting ready to haul herself up. "He doesn't sound that band," she added as she pushed away from the table. Immediately Pam and I launched into action. I swatted at her hands and Pam ordered her back in the chair.

"He was maybe not the most exciting fellow," I conceded. "He treated me well, though. And you are one to talk. You think he was bad? Do you remember that guy who had you wearing all that black leather? Oh, or the one with the hair?"

"Having hair hardly seems as though it would be detrimental to his character." That comment came from Amelia, looking mighty lost sitting in her chair as Pam and I cleaned her kitchen. A normal person would relish the opportunity to boss others about, but Amelia was struggling to take it easy. She had explained to me more than once that women have been giving birth since the beginning of time and if every time a woman got pregnant she decided to lie down and do nothing than the world would just fall apart. Logistically I understood her argument and really, if it was anyone but Amelia I would agree, but I had been there through the struggle and saw firsthand her difficulty to conceive. I couldn't in good conscience not do everything I could to make her life a little easier. Especially considering how truly complicated it was about to become.

I turned to Amelia, fully prepared to demonstrate the hair with my hands, my own hair and what ever other props might have been necessary, but I was stopped by the look on Pam's face. The look said all that I didn't need to, that yes, the hair was that detrimental.

"It was like Vanilla Ice meets Flock of Seagulls."

"He was trying to bring back new wave," Pam defended much in the same way I had been defending my own ex.

"It was 2002. And new wave was not coming back." In the charming ways that old friends like to bring up each other's bad moments, Pam and I carried on for a while reminiscing about the mistakes of our past. Amelia, for the most part, sat back and looked amused but every so often would contribute an anecdote or a sympathetic sigh.

It had been too long since we had been alone to do this together. Nothing but enjoy each other's company, but as our lives became more and more complicated it seemed we has less and less time together and soon it would be even less with the impending arrival of baby.

Sometime around midnight the unmistakable footsteps sounded out in the hallway, growing louder as they neared. It was like a herd of elephants. A driving drum beat that propelled my body out of the chair I had been comfortably sitting in, causing my body to function without my mind. My coat was on and I was saying goodbyes, rushing to gather my shit at lightning speed.

"You don't have to leave," Amelia insisted as I rushed around like a lunatic. I never moved that fast, but put me in an uncomfortable situation and watch me go. I am like the fucking Flo Jo of awkward encounters.

The guys burst in to the room as men tend to do, never content with simply opening the door and walking in one at a time. I shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other as they filled the door and then the hall and then there was no escape and I was in the midst of my own personal hell. I looked everywhere until I realized I was behaving foolishly and my gaze finally ended with Alcide. The tension filled the room like a vacuum, sucking out all the necessary air for breathing. It wasn't like everyone didn't know already, as evidenced by the fact that we all were finally allowed to "know" about Amelia and Tray's family expanding, we were shit with secrets, even if they were our own.

"I'm going home," I offered even though no one had asked and it was only met with stiff nods and blank stares. It sounded like I was reading lines off a cue card. Jesus, it's a wonder anyone even lets me out of the house.

"Okay," Alcide said suddenly and about ten decibels too loud. We fucking bowed to one another before I scuttled through the door, my purse catching on the door, causing my passage to play out like some kind of comedy sketch.

"I'll go with you." This I heard only faintly in the background of my humiliation as I was still pushing my way through the hallway. When I was finally freed I spun to see Eric coming our behind me, waving to everyone as he shut the door behind us.

"You don't have to," I said, quite surprised it would have even occurred to him to walk me home. "It isn't that far."

He shrugged his enormous shoulders and took my bag from me, slinging it messenger style across his body. Any other man would sling a bag around his shoulders and look strange or burdened, but Eric looked like Eric with a bag around his body completely unaffected by any potential embarrassment associated with the look. I followed silently, careful to keep a bit of distance between us.

"So, you two have a fight?" We were halfway to our apartment and the walk had been going fine up until that point. Eric and I could get along fine as long as neither of us talked. I looked up at him at the exact moment he turned to stare off into the distance down the street. He jammed his large hands into his pockets with a force that propelled his shoulders up by his ears.

It was then that the distance that I had been ignoring all that time suddenly swelled up and slapped me in the face. The palpable awkwardness, the summation of all our parts. We were no longer as we had once been and it was as plain as day and waiting for me to vocalize it.

"We are…no longer." I wasn't sure how else to put it and even if I wanted to say it, but there it was. I left it there, hanging in the air without explanation.

Three doors shy of our apartment he sprung another question on me. It seemed as though he was always doing this to me, springing things on me at the last possible moment so that I would have to either come up with an answer on the spot or risk the ball being in my court forever. Sure, we could continue the discussion once inside, but we never would. It was like our apartment was the black hole of conversation.

"Can I tell you a secret?"

'No. No, please do not tell me a secret', I wanted to yell at him. Can't you feel how uncomfortable this is? Why do you always just want to pretend these moments are normal? But I didn't say any of that because I never do and I only nodded that yes, of course, he could tell me his secrets because I was a fucking sucker for him and apparently a glutton for punishment.

"I'm going to produce the band's album myself." That wasn't what I was expecting, not that I knew what I was expecting but not that. He must have taken my silence as a good sign though, because he plunged into a rapid explanation. "Record labels are dead, I figure, right? The music business isn't what it used to be and we don't need to sit around waiting to be discovered when we can do it our own damn selves. I don't think it can be all that hard considering we have the funds and there are so many music blogs, everything is digital. This way I could protect the dignity of the whole thing and not have to compromise what I want."

"I'm really proud of you," I said strangely, like I had any right to even be proud of him. But he thanked me and the way that he said it I thought that he was truly grateful, that he wanted me to be proud of him. That I was giving him something that he was seeking.

In front of our door he turned his body to block me from the stairs, halting me in my path.

"I'm really sorry about Alcide. That sucks."

"Yeah," I responded and I shifted my weight to my back foot and pivoted towards the street because I was too uncomfortable to meet his eyes.

...

I would be lying if I said that some days at work were not more enjoyable than others. It was the morning of the day I was supposed to be going to see Isabelle and I had, sadly, been unable to wrangle myself a date for the occasion. I wasn't really bothered by the thought of going alone; after all, I was working.

Growing up in the south I experienced the seasons as a single long mutating season that moved agonizingly from hot and humid to damp and cool and back again. One of the wonders of the north, in my opinion, is the seasons. And not even just that they exist, but the cunning way in which they appear all of a sudden with full force. Like you turned your head just a fraction too late and missed the tiny fairies painting all the leaves bright red and burning orange. It was as though the city were lit on fire from my tiny cubicle on the seventh floor.

The best thing about having a cubicle is that you can exist in utter silence without any distractions. Working from home always proved a bit more difficult when Eric was around and lord knows Mr. Responsibility was always down for avoiding work. My only agenda for the day was quote unquote research, which actually was just me leaning back in my ergonomically sound chair, my feet propped up on an overturned wastepaper basket, listening to Isabelle's one and only album on repeat.

The music was pleasing, not entirely original, but definitely a departure from what was popular on the scene. It fell somewhere in between folk and pop if I had to categorize it, full of strong lyrics with quirky riffs. There was an abundance of the requisite acoustic guitar, but a pleasantly surprising array of musical instruments that had me grateful I wouldn't have to draw endless comparisons to Ani Difranco and spend the chunk of my evening listening to protest songs and fighting the battle to legalize marijuana.

It was in the middle of this midday oasis when Lafayette popped his head over the edge of my cubicle and tapped my desk loudly enough to draw my attention.

"Yes?" I questioned sweetly as I pulled an earbud from my right ear and tapped the music off with my mouse.

"Are you comfortable?" He asked with a comical sneer. Lafayette was a hard worker to be sure, but had an excellent, easy going personality.

"I love my job," I cooed with exaggeration. He shook his head as I adjusted myself to a sitting position. We spent a while chatting about office gossip, the little that can be generated by twelve people, and finally we got around to discussing my assignment that evening. I had to inform him that sadly I was going alone. I had asked Pam. She had turned me down, obviously, but when I asked her she had been curious about the Wednesday bit. I merely explained I hadn't booked the date it was only my job to attend. She continued to complain so I checked her off as a lost cause. I really didn't have anyone else to ask so I decided I would be the big girl I knew I could be and go to the show by myself. Really, the idea didn't bother me so much and I figured I'd be working so it mattered very little who was hanging around waiting for me. Lafayette, on the other hand, was completely appalled and insisted that he and his boyfriend accompany me.

"This is not okay to wear," he advised as he left my desk, using his index finger in a circling motion to indicate my outfit.

"Oh—" I began to protest, but he cut me off before I couldn't even finish the word.

He didn't even say anything, but dismissed me with a flick of his wrist and a roll of his eyes. It looked like I had a date to get ready for.


	15. These Songs in Our Throats

**This chapter isn't beta'd because I needed to post it before I ended up hanging on to it for another six months. I do not own anything, if it sucks I apologize, and you guys should thank _Miral _because her kind words were the reason I posted it.**

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Chapter Fifteen: These Songs in Our Throats

"Yes?" I was twirling in the small room that had been designated as the fashion department looking for confirmation that I wasn't dressed like a desperate slut. In all reality the 'room' was little more than three temporary walls constructed around a decent corner of the office, but it served its purpose well. I was presenting myself for approval by Lafayette and Jesus, both who were dressed far better than what the occasion called for. I didn't have the heart, or the balls honestly, to saw anything. I was so chicken shit; in fact, I was currently circling round in a blush colored bandage dress that was a far cry from the jeans and t-shirt I had planned on wearing because I was afraid of incurring the wrath of the two men who stood before me.

"You look incandescent. Like a fairy," Jesus said as he pulled on the ends of my curls, causing them to spring up in all directions. I was certainly having a moment. I had voiced concerns that the look was unprofessional but Lafayette had admonished me because I apparently worked in an industry that demanded I show up for interviews looking like I thought I was hot shit as well. Clearly I had put up an excellent argument.

So off we went the three of us dressed like we were going to the goddamned VMA's instead of a shit hole no one had ever heard of in a neighborhood none of us frequented. I had pretty much long since learned that Lafayette was the type of person who made his own reality. It didn't matter that we looked utterly overdressed and out of place, when you were with Lafayette it was just like you were the only ones who had gotten the memo and everyone else was underdressed.

We emerged from our cab and immediately entered the bar while Jesus chatted with the doorman who was apparently an old friend. The place was considerably crowded, certainly much more than anticipated for a Wednesday evening. A short trip to the bar and twelve bucks later we reconvened at a table Jesus was watching guard over. "Are you going to be sad reporter girl all night?" Jesus sighed as I sat down and pulled my notebook from my purse.

"Alas," I answered. "This is not all pleasure." I quickly scribbled a few notes as Jesus surveyed the crowd somewhat loudly. He had a wry sense of humor and several times I was forced to duck my head to avoid the glares of the people who were close enough to hear us openly mocking them. Lafayette clucked in dismay, but readily joined in on our admittedly cruel fun. Gradually we drifted away from the people surrounding us and began talking about work, the conversation veering towards personal subject matter. It was nice to be out with them even if I was a third wheel. We had begun to get to know one another at work, but this was a vastly more intimate setting. It was clear to me they were loving with each other, but also with others. They seemed to truly care to hear the answers to the questions they asked and I felt a little like I was the one being interviewed as I ceaselessly answered questions about my life.

"I cannot get over that you live with a man. Platonically." Lafayette had been revisiting the subject of my living arrangements frequently. He had already somewhat known I lived with a man, but I believe he really thought I was sleeping with Eric. I had tried several times already to explain the situation but he was focused on the cohabitation portion of the equation. Especially since I let it slip that Eric was incredibly good looking. That was the moment that really made him sit up and take notice. I was concerned that it had been something in my voice, my tone maybe, that had betrayed me. Luckily, I was saved from having to explain again because the lights dimmed and from the mess of speakers and wires at the side of the stage emerged a slight figure.

It was difficult to make her out as she moved towards the center of the stage, but when she approached the mic and turned to face the crowd there was no ambiguity about her. Distinct, beautiful, her slender frame slightly hunched beneath the weight of her acoustic guitar. It was like fucking Gwyneth Paltrow and Kate Moss had time traveled to 1994, denied the physical impossibilities of reproduction and gave birth to a love child. Tall, willowy, lithe, all kinds of adjectives that would never apply to me. This girl had it in spades. Her hair was a warm chestnut color, cropped short at the back, but fell in heavy bangs across her eyes creating a sort of haphazard sexiness that very few women could pull off without looking like drug addict. She was obviously one of them.

"Hello," she cooed into the waiting microphone and I detected a slight accent in her voice. Southern. Texan, perhaps. One by one young men began filling the stage around her, each taking up their respective instrument and assuming the position, waiting on her word to begin. "Sorry to drag you all out here on a Wednesday night, I know that must seem terribly uncool of me to begin my tour on a Wednesday." The crowd tittered in response and she gave a slight shrug that indicated a certain humble self-deprecation. "But I'm so glad you could come out and I'm so excited to play for all of you. I hope you enjoy." With that last word she stepped away from the microphone and a kind of booming silence enveloped the room. The kind of quiet that can only be heard when you are listening for something and it is not there. But just as soon as the silence registered it was gone as one sharp note escaped her throat, stark and powerful as it rang out through the room. Gradually the music swelled, each musician easing into the song until it swallowed the room whole.

The music I had spent hours listening to on my laptop all day long had in no way prepared me for what I experienced jammed in between the corner of the unnaturally short bar table that jutted painfully in my ribcage and some anonymous hipster that insisted on standing uncomfortably close to me while he shook his body in a way that had me half expecting he would begin foaming at the mouth any second. I had started out sitting but quickly I realized that wasn't an option, as had Jesus and Lafayette, shoved against one another and several rowdy co-eds in front of me. This wasn't some pretentious hipster dive on a midweek night. It was a moment in time unparalleled by the combined experiences of its captivated audience.

It was in the steady driving rhythm, the hard down beat which had us all slamming our feet in unison as if we had known the words all along. It was quietly aggressive. Not in any sort of obvious manner, but in a pervasive way which suggested that this girl knew how to feel and knew even better how to make others feel. For some, the speed of a song, the volume, the violence, that is what connects them to the emotions behind the words, but Isabelle drove home her pain with a marching beat, so slow it haunted you and so quiet that each time her voice tore away from her it was like the outlet for our collective suffering. The palpable sound of our hearts beating within our chests as we all rose to our feet and stomped around as though the syncopation was truly keeping us alive, that was what this music did to you.

There are times in the midst of an experience that is unbearably awesome that you are unable to stand back and examine the moment objectively—to see it in the present how you will forever see it in your mind. And perhaps it is meant to be that way, but if you could step back, if you were truly free to witness the wonder before you it would perhaps look as though this is what it is all for. For the moment that shakes you from your self-induced coma, the one that you rely on to get you through the days. Because this is all we are, all we are working towards and all that we will ever be. The steady pulsating beat of the drum. Because we are all the same, we will all reach the same conclusions of silence but getting there in such a way that ignites you with the feeling of being alive happens so tragically infrequent.

There are times I feel so utterly alive that forever seems possible. That the slim chance that maybe I am invincible can exist. And what do I do with this feeling? I go home and quietly live my life because it's much easier than confronting my fears.

The mass of people seemed to swell to hundreds as their bodies, slick with sweat, crowded in on me. Normally I would back away, fold in on myself but I didn't, I pushed back. I danced wild in large circles as my body led the way through the rest of the song. Jesus' arm looped around my hip twirling me with him and I closed my eyes, trusting him to lead.

When you lose your parents at a young age you tend to want to believe in heaven. My idea of heaven was never really tainted with the idea of sins and morality, though, and when I imagined heaven I imagined it was much like that crowded dingy little bar with so many bodies moving together as they abandoned the pretense of their lives.

When the last song ended the rapture of the crowd hung in the air.

"Thank you," Isabelle managed through the effervescent smile that couldn't seem to leave her face. The band was already off the stage and she followed quickly behind. And though the band was now gone the energy still filled the room-we all had been through something together that had irrevocably bonded us. Lafayette, who I sort of assumed would have been too cool for all of this, was enthusing over the music and Jesus was equally enthralled by it all. I was mostly trying to contain my hair which had taken on a life of its own in my absentminded fun. The fact that this was working, that right now I was working, had completely slipped my mind. While we were still rehashing the performance the most unexpected thing occurred. Slowly, from the din at the back of the room someone began stopping their feet and calling out for an encore. At first it was just the lone voice, hoarse with the effort to be heard above the crowd, but slowly more and more people began to join in. We raised our glasses and toasted one another, gleefully saluting people I had never before laid eyes on and I was shockingly sober. First the band returned, slowly the musicians filed in up the narrow staircase filling the stage once more. I thought of a line that I wanted to write and before it could slip back out of my head I dove back to the table to write it down. When I turned around my stomach dropped clear to the floor. If I had to hazard a guess that sucker was somewhere near my toes because there on the stage next to Isabelle stood my roommate looking perfectly at home with a guitar around his neck.

"That. Was fucking awesome. Thanks to these dudes," she gestured behind her to the band. "I'd like you all to meet someone. This here is my friend, Eric. Everyone say hello."

"Hello," came a rowdy response from the crowd. Clearly taken with his good looks and easy rock star appeal they erupted in applause. He bowed his head slightly, a show of humble modesty I knew to be mostly bullshit, though it still endeared me to him as a fan of sorts.

"Well then, we're fixin' to play some songs that I didn't write, but Eric did and we really hope you enjoy them."

Eric grinned a faux bashful grin that lasted just a brief moment, but in it I could see the Eric I knew. It seemed that I was getting better at putting the two Erics of my mind together. On the surface Eric the musician and Eric my roommate were completely unlike, but upon closer inspection they were much the same. Flirtatious and self-assured, they both knew their audience and how to play to it.

Upon Eric's count the band began to play. They played several songs I had heard many times before, both in the privacy of my own home and at Lou's. The final song, however, was one that I had never heard outside of our apartment. It was slow, wandering almost and though I had often heard the wordless song played through the walls in the night it became quite a different song when Isabelle sweetly counted, "Two, three, four-"

It was perhaps the gentle lilting quality of her voice that drew you in, at times a whisper and at others a howl. Or maybe the warm, coarse hum of the guitar under Eric's skilled fingers that made the song feel like a lost love I had never known. Whatever it was I knew it made my heart hurt.

I kissed Lafayette and Jesus goodnight and seated myself at the bar to watch the anticlimactic sight of the crowd slowly dispersing out in to the night. Halfway through my drink I saw him approaching out of the corner of my eye. As if anyone would ever be able to miss him. When he reached the bar he sat next to me and lifted his finger to the bartender.

"Didn't expect to see you here," he commented after a beer had been placed on the bar before him.

"Funny, I was about to say the same thing." I watched him peel a couple of ones from a fold of bills and lay them side by side, face up on the bar. "You added words," I said a minute later, not expanding on the thought—he knew what I meant.

"They're a work in progress."

"No, they're good. I like them." He hummed his appreciation awkwardly. And who could blame him? This was one doozy of an awkward conversation. I was nearly about to ask about how he knew Isabelle. The words were just at the tip of my tongue when she appeared at his side, waving her hands towards me and gesticulating before I had even introduced myself.

"I'm so incredibly sorry; I can't believe I've kept you waiting. You're Sookie, right? I was told blonde and lots of it."

I laughed generously at her description; Halleigh must have been the one to talk to her. Halleigh was sort of the designated office admin, a cheerful petite woman who was always describing things in the most unique way. "Yes, that's me," I replied and extended my hand to shake hers, "It's nice to meet you."

"I see you've met Eric." I would have laughed if I didn't see in her face that she was entirely serious. Yeah, we've met. Though by the look on Eric's face you would never know it. I was almost certain he was about to deny our acquaintance, but before I could save face and agree vaguely that we had met he rushed to explain we lived together. "Not together together. Just together." Then it dawned on me. Jesus, he was explaining to his girlfriend that he lived with another woman. I couldn't even have predicted on my best day that this was where the evening was going.

"Oh," she finally responded. Just 'oh'. Then she repeated my name to herself, like suddenly it all made sense. Things then took a really bizarre turn because a strange, sad smile came over her face and she moved towards me, arms out. Hugs do not get much more uncomfortable than that one. If my boyfriend had just told me he lived with a single (not entirely horrible looking) woman I doubted I would take it quite so well.

I caught Eric's gaze over her shoulder. He looked as if someone has just shot his dog.

She was even lovelier up close than on the stage. Her delicate wrists led the way through most of our conversation. The light jingle of thin silver bangles punctuating each provoking response she gave me. She spoke with her hands so much that it seemed she was making a concerted effort to still herself. At the end of each question she would wrap her two hands around her coffee cup, allowing her fingers to intertwine as they met in the middle. But each time, as soon as she began talking her hands found themselves in the air, doodling and diagraming her words across the open space between us. It was hopelessly charming and I delighted silently each time her fingers flung themselves from the confines of her cup. I stumbled my way through journalist amateur hour and each time she came back with something even more profound than I would have even thought possible. Not that I was bitter. Honestly, she spoke aloud like I wished I wrote. Thoughtful and aware, not forced or pretentious and so fucking pertinent that I had go back a few times and make sure that I hadn't just filled in the spaces between her thoughts.

Our time was running down and I had covered all inane areas that sadly, were necessary to cover if you wanted a major piece in trendy magazine. We had all our bases covered and now came the part where we could just have a conversation like two normal people. Well, two relatively normal people anyway.

I crunched my straw into my mostly empty glass of water, handing out a slow painful death to each ice cube I met. My pen poised above my notebook. "What is it about music?" I wasn't clear whether I was asking her or myself, but she answered before I did.

"There is so much sadness in this life, so much pain and hurt." Her twinkling accompaniment ceased for a brief moment before it started up again ever so lightly. "We haven't all been gifted with the words to say how we feel. And so, music—it gives us a chance to express ourselves. To confront the things that have brought us to our knees and to make it hurt a little less. It's like we're all walking around with these songs trapped inside us, some of them come out as music, some paintings, novels; it's all art. I don't even know if music was always my first love." She paused at this and gave me a significant look. "When did you know you wanted to be a writer?"

I stopped jabbing the ice in my glass, brought my hand down to the table and really considered the question. "I don't know if I ever decided to be a writer. It's just a piece of me, I guess. Even if I was waiting tables in my hometown I would probably still be a writer."

"Exactly," she said, pushing her finger down into my notepad. "We are who we are, I didn't choose music, it chose me. My mother woke my whole house up every morning singing at the top of her lungs. My mother can't sing worth shit, but damn it if she doesn't do it with as much soul as she has to give. That's what makes music beautiful, the desire to share yourself with others."

I was nodding now and scribbling as fast as my hands would allow, completely absorbed in what I was writing down.

"Can I ask you a question?" Finishing up my thoughts I placed the pen down and held it at either end my fingers. "Can we talk off the record?"

Once our bill was paid we pushed out into the street. It was an unseasonably warm night and the streets were uncharacteristically quiet. We walked a few blocks before she began.

"I know you don't know me from a hole in the wall and I actually have no business saying any of this to you, but it just feels like it might be one of those things that I will always wish I had said when I had the chance. Do you know what I mean?" Did I know what she meant? I routinely lived the better part of my conversational life in my head. So yes, I understood why she felt that she needed to say whatever it was she was going to say. And I couldn't really blame her; I might have done the same thing. I smiled, as wide and genuinely as I could considering what I assumed was coming, and encouraged her to continue.

"I've known Eric a long time." Oh my god, it's so much worse than I anticipated. I'm coaching myself to breathe through this. "Same circles and what have you. In all that time we were just casual acquaintances. Friendly strangers, I guess. Anyway, I was with Hugo for a large portion of that time. Hugo and I had met just after college, we had both graduated from the same school and never once in four years had we crossed paths. I was revving up for a career of waitressing and dreaming about the day I would make it big and Hugo was beginning law school. We couldn't have been on two more different paths and yet, somehow, against all odds we had managed to find one another in this world. It seemed as though we were meant to be. And for a time, I suppose we were. And then we weren't anymore. Hugo had betrayed me. A big, messy betrayal that left my heart strewn all over the place and when that happened I found refuge in my music. The more time I spent with my music the more time I spent with musicians. Eric, in particular, found his way into my heart and we became friends."

She paused in her story, looked at me sideways and winced just so. "Of course, not just friends, but I don't need to explain Eric to you." She rushed on with her story, clearly relieved with getting that portion out of the way and it was then I began to realize that this story wasn't panning out quite like I thought it would. "We figured out pretty early on that wasn't going to work for us, but we remained friends after that. So imagine my surprise, after knowing Eric for all these years, when he begins to tell me about the woman he lives with. The crazy, neurotic, beautiful woman who wants nothing to do with him."

We kept walking at a steady pace, not purposefully towards anything but forward—onwards. I did my best to maintain whatever composure I had and listened to what she was telling me.

"Suddenly, the Eric that I had known for so long was a completely different man. He was always going on and on about how he needed to stop dicking around, to make serious considerations as to how he was living his life. He made a business plan, began working harder than I had ever seen him work, not only on his music but on himself.

"He's quit smoking five times in the past six months, I am fairly certain he had his hair trimmed and I have it on extremely good authority that Eric has gone the longest without sex he has ever gone since puberty."

I suddenly couldn't take it anymore. What was she getting at? First I thought that she was going to initiate some sort of female pissing contest over Eric, whom I had assumed she was dating, and now she was telling me how much of a changed man he had become?

"Why are you telling me all this?" I could hear the confusion in my own voice. Its shaky uncertainty sounded frightened even to myself.

"Because I'm afraid you won't let yourself see it and he's too goddamned proud to let you know."

"Please don't take this the wrong way, but you don't know me." I wasn't trying to be defensive, but who did she think she was just assuming that I needed someone to swoop in to help me see the real Eric? Hadn't Tray tried this same thing before? Had Eric changed? Maybe. Maybe he had, but did that mean that I believed that people could change? Really and truly change?

She stopped walking suddenly and I was forced to turn back to face her. "I saw the way he looked at you tonight. All I'm saying is that you should take a good long look at the guy some time. You might be surprised by what you see."

* * *

**So, I don't know how invested anyone still is in this story but here's the deal. I have half of the next chapter written, it's short but crucial. The catch? It's a big cliffie. I hate when authors post crucial moments and then don't post anything for a long time after. Given my spotty (at best) posting history I will leave the decision up to you.****  
**

**Would you rather I post a huge cliffhanger because I have it written now or wait until I have a resolution?  
**

**Thank you for reading and giving a crap, because seriously I have felt like I have lost the voice of this story so many times and then just one person has to PM me out of the blue and I'm inspired again.  
**


	16. As a Song That Goes Before Me

**a/n: hi, it's been awhile. this is unbeta'd. i fought through some major writers block to produce this, my apologies for any mistakes. the title belongs to bryan john appleby. **

* * *

Chapter Sixteen: As a Song that Goes Before Me

I thought about what Isabelle said. I understood where she was coming from. Eric was a good guy. I had never questioned that and knowing that his friendship inspired completely unsolicited advice from near strangers was admirable as hell. But in the same breath she was confessing to having a casual sexual encounter with the guy and that really made me question if she knew where I was coming from. Eric wasn't the devil by any means, but who could expect any self-respecting person to see him and think it was a good idea to try and pursue a monogamous relationship?

The fact remained though, for whatever reason I just kept coming back to it. Because, maybe—what if?

'What if' had become my new favorite pastime. What if he really had changed? What if he had suddenly grown into an emotionally functional adult capable of having a real relationship? What if I wanted to believe there was hope for us?

Eric had never pretended to be anyone other than himself. When I had first met him he had laid it all out bare. I had rejected the offer, clearly, but we had somehow managed to become friends. And that was when I was able to fully appreciate the trail of bodies he left behind. But I think I was blinded by a lot of things, among them moral indignation and unresolved feelings. Eric never offered those women any more than he was actually willing to give. He didn't lie to seduce women, promise things he never intended to follow through on. Each of those girls woke up fully expecting to be alone, never expecting to hear from him again and satisfied with what they had received in the arrangement. Eric wasn't in a committed relationship—not a philanderer. Polite, considerate, always let those girls spend the night instead of kicking them out immediately following. I wasn't trying to canonize the man, but certainly worse crimes had been committed by men I had allowed much closer.

So, what was the difference then? Why did it matter that I would continue to date a man for years when I knew he wasn't the one, but couldn't take a chance on my sloppy, secretly sensitive, unbelievably sexy roommate?

Because what if. What if Eric turned out to be everything that I ever wanted? Ever needed? And what if he broke my heart?

I was afraid and in the worst way possible. Dating men who didn't scare me wasn't some sort of emotional maturity I possessed. I was so scared I couldn't even admit it to myself. So scared I couldn't bring myself to get past that. The more I thought about it the less sense I could make of it all. So I reached the only conclusion I could. I decided to stop thinking about it.

I couldn't erase the past. We all had history, I wasn't a total fool. Yes, most relationships are spared that kind of up close and personal experience with the past. I had served Eric's history coffee. No amount of analysis was going to change that, though. I had two options as I saw it. I could stop picking it apart and see what happened or I could agonize over it for the rest of my life, trying to plan out his every response to my actions until I missed out completely.

Whether Eric's past thrilled me or not I still couldn't deny the fact that I clearly felt something for him. What good was it doing me to deny that?

So one afternoon when I got home from work we were both sitting on the couch, talking, eating a two-day old bag of stale movie popcorn Eric had brought home. It was a perfectly ordinary day when nothing particular happened and that was the day it all changed. The day before we were nothing more than just friends. And then, just like that, we were _something. _All he did was lean in to tell me a joke. He was so close I could have touched his lips with mine using very little effort and that knowledge, for some stupid reason, made my breath catch. The second the gasp left my mouth he stopped his story and fixed me with such a questioning look it made me think I had said something aloud. We just stared at each other for an eternity and then nothing, but after that day it hadn't been the same. It became very clear to me that we were becoming something.

That something felt a bit more like fight club than it did a relationship, though.

First rule of fight club is you don't talk about fight club. If they handed out Nobel Prizes for the most awkwardly dysfunctional non-dating I really think that he and I would take the prize. Not only did we not talk about whatever it was that we were not doing, we didn't ever acknowledge that anything had changed. It was obvious it had, but neither of us was going to mention it. We were both too afraid, I think, of ruining what was happening.

That first night that he snuck into my room I nearly had a heart attack. I was jolted away from a restless sleep by the slow, soft creaks of the floorboards beneath his steps. Like the incredibly sane person I am the first conclusion that my mind jumped to was a mass murdering rapist was breaking into my room to violate me before slicing and dicing my body to bits only to scatter my remains across the island of Manhattan. I held myself deathly still, the covers pulled up around my face, trying to stifle my breathing against the duvet cover. I felt a body lower itself down next to mine, careful not to rest its weight against me and I tried desperately not to jump out of my skin when the blankets were peeled away from my face to reveal Eric.

"Sweet Jesus," I breathed. He had the nerve to look amused and I felt like punching him in the face. "I thought you were going to rape and kill me." I held my hands over my chest, pushing down in an effort to calm my heart.

"Hey. Sookie, look at me." I could hear the concern in his voice so I looked up.

"What?" I didn't bother trying to keep my aggravation out of my voice, but a felt a little bad when his features softened even more.

"I didn't mean to scare you. Do you want me to leave?" His warm body was pressing up against mine at this point leaving me slightly pinned beneath his weight. I shook my head and concentrated on keeping my breath even for very different reasons now. "I have a proposition for you." He was close now, his voice keeping a low even tone, conscious of our position.

"And that would be?" I prompted him when he failed to go on.

"You and I should go on a date."

"We should?" I was completely taken by surprise. Of all of the things I was able to imagine that Eric would say after sneaking into my room late at night, the proposal that we go on a formal date together was not on that list. "When?" Because what else could I say to that.

"Tomorrow. If you aren't doing anything." Tomorrow was Saturday and as fate would have it I didn't have plans.

"Would it be like a day date?"

"Well, yeah. A day date."

I thought this over for a moment. I found myself suspiciously giddy about the prospect of going on a date with Eric and my inner cynic wanted to crush that before I could get carried away. At the same time I was trying to be less like myself and more like someone who impulsively agreed to go on day dates with their kind-of love interest in the early morning hours.

"What would we do on this day date? Or am I not allowed to know?"

"It would be a surprise. However, I'm willing to tell you up front that it will be the most enjoyable day date that you have ever had and I think that there is a strong possibility that I may ruin you for all other men."

"You do know what they say about day dates, right?" Following this I yawned. A wide, loud, unattractive yawn that I attempted to stifle with my blankets. I heard him laugh slightly and then he bent his head forward and rested his forehead against the crook of my neck.

"No, Sookie. What do they say about day dates?" He was teasing, but I didn't so much mind. I liked the feel of his body pressed against mine, the warm sensations that this closeness was producing. I liked the feel of his weight in my bed and not in a slutty way, just in a way that appreciated how comfortable I was sharing my most intimate space with this man.

I couldn't name the move that I was thinking of with the bit about the day dates. I was trying to remember slash trying to fight off the warmth of sleep that was threatening to take over my thought process when I felt Eric gently pull the blankets away from my face. I moaned a bit and rolled my body the best I could so that my face was towards his.

"Day dates mean you don't like me." This was oversimplified, but the best I could do in my current state.

He was still on top of the blankets, but by pulling them away from my face he had somehow managed to wrap his arms around my torso. His lips barely grazed my ear and even half asleep I immediately felt that rush in the pit of my stomach. My breathing hitched, but I kept my eyes closed tight—I was too afraid of what might happen if I opened them.

"I assure you, Sookie Stackhouse. I like you very much."

I feel asleep shortly after that and when I woke up in the morning I was alone in my bed, though I had a strong suspicion that he had left only recently. I dressed and sat in the kitchen drinking coffee, listening to the sounds of the city outside, contemplating whether or not I had dreamed Eric into my bed. It was when I went to get a refill that I discovered I hadn't imagined it at all. There on the fridge was an envelope with boxy all capitals print; a note.

_Went for a run. Don't forget our date. Dress warm. –E_

The clothes I had chosen were more fashionable than functional, so following his instructions I returned to my room to change. When I emerged I found that Eric had returned home and was sitting on the couch waiting for me. "Why didn't you knock?" I asked as I pulled a scarf over my head.

He looked from the book on his lap and smiled. "Didn't want to rush you. Are you ready?"

"As a matter of fact I am. Where are we going?"

"Nice try, but I'm still not telling. He disappeared into the kitchen and I heard some rustling. "All set." He was stuffing a pack of cigarettes into his pocket.

It was awkward from the moment we stepped out the door. Or rather, _I_ was awkward from the moment we stepped out the door. I wasn't quite sure how to act and that was translating into fidgeting and uncomfortable silences on my part. Eric didn't seem to mind. He was animated and talkative, carrying on both sides of the conversion in my absence. We stopped to get coffee, browsed a bookstore I had never been to. At first I wasn't quite sure this was so much a date as it was just a walk through the city and then I realized what it was we were doing. We were visiting the places he normally went, the places he spent his time in.

It was sort of a perfect date I had to admit to myself. We really hadn't gone anywhere and yet it was as if I had seen an entirely new world. Eric was sharp and funny. My own personal tour guide as we wandered the streets in no real rush, contented to be together. We finally wound up in front a non-descript building in a neighborhood I couldn't identify by my surroundings.

"Where are we?" I asked as I look around distractedly trying to figure out where it was he led me. I let my sunglasses slide down my nose a bit and peered over the top at him. "Is this where you kill me and hide the pieces?"

He laughed and reached an arm around my shoulders, pulling me tightly to his side. "You're always one step ahead of me, Sookie."

I reached my arm around his waist, swallowed almost completely by his large embrace. The sight of us side by side must have been laughable. "Are we going in?"

"You still don't know where you are. Are you sure you want to?"

"I'll take my chances," I replied and he let him arm drop back down. It took a great deal of effort to push away the feelings of disappointment that rose up as he separated from me.

We walked up several winding, crooked flights of stairs to a hallway with blank walls equally sterile and dingy with age. I was still at a complete loss as to where he had taken me. There were unmarked doors that lined the hall, each shut tight with no lights peeking out from underneath.

In a way it reminded me of college during my senior year when I took a directed study with my English professor. He was an older man from Ireland. He spoke with a wonderful accent and wore these sweaters with elbow patches and leather buttons. He was everything you could ever hope from a professor, really. We would meet in his cramped little office in a building that couldn't even be considered as part of the campus and have these long, intense discussions about James Joyce and Samuel Beckett.

My head was off somewhere in my memories when Eric abruptly stopped in front of another nondescript door which was no different from the one that stood directly across the way. He looked down at me and smirked a bit before pulling a set of keys from his pocket and unlocking the door. Instead of walking in he stood there, watching me. He was waiting, I realized, for me to enter first.

I smiled at his manners and stepped through the door. The moment I looked into the room I knew I was in the band's practice space. Now, I had known this place existed in theory since I had met them all. Amelia herself had told me this is where they spent a great deal of their time. She had only been here a few times, though, because the way she put it this was their sanctuary.

The space I imagined in my mind was far more sparse with metal folding chairs, overflowing ashtrays and empty beer bottles strewn about. In reality the room was homey and warm and gave me the sneaking suspicion that Tray had a great deal of input into the decoration of their home. A large leather couch and an oversized chair occupied a single corner of the room. On the opposite side was a whole set-up with drums, microphones, amps, guitars. All neatly posed and ready to play.

I shot a grin over my shoulder at Eric who was standing against the door, hands in his pockets. He looked as though he were awaiting my approval and seeing the look on my face caused him to relax just a bit. The late afternoon sun came through the enormous windows that reached floor to ceiling bathing the room in a fiery glow. I walked around the room and stopped in the center where a large table, that looked to be serving as a desk, divided the room.

Leaning against the table I placed both hands flat on its surface and stared straight ahead at Eric.

"Now what?" I was teasing him, but he didn't seem to notice as he pushed himself from the door and crossed the room to me with such purpose. He stopped at the opposite side of the table and just looked at me. At first it was fine and then that moment stretched out longer than was comfortable. His unflinching gaze caused my breath to catch and my lungs to tighten so sharply I was certain I wouldn't be able to breathe again.

The sun was setting and burning the whole world up with it. Eric looked so powerful and strong, but vulnerable. I can't pretend to know what he was thinking as he stood there just staring, but I wish I had known. I wish I had asked.

I saw something in his eyes that made me stop. It was pain and desire and a million other things I couldn't pinpoint and didn't want to. He looked conflicted or, I don't know—apprehensive. I should have gone to him. I wanted to.

And then just like that the spell was broken and he disappeared into the corner. He dug into the equipment and fiddled with some wires before returning with a laptop and giant headphones in hand. I was instructed to sit on the couch and when he spoke I noticed that his mood seemed like it shifted completely and he was once again himself. I complied and sat myself down cross-legged on the couch.

"May I?" He gestured with the headphones. I lifted my head to indicate he had my permission. He leaned in close just then. His warm, smoky smell invading my senses. I was doing my best to resist my natural flight reflexes. All day we had been close but just out of reach. It really hadn't been so bad, but after that little staring contest it felt like torment.

I held still and felt his fingers so gently ease the headphones over my ears, carefully positioning the band so that it did not disturb my carefully constructed bun. Neither of us spoke and there was nothing but a few clicking keys and some distant chirps of the computer in ears as a few moments passed. Eric was still incredibly close, much too close and I was painfully aware of my suddenly labored breathing as I waited for whatever it was that was coming.

Too much time had passed. I was starting to lose my composure when he pried the earpiece loose from my left ear and leaned in to whisper, his rough, low voice sending shivers down my arms. "Trust me."

And then music filled my ears. Immediately I knew this meant he finished the album. For weeks I had asked to hear some of it, any of it and he had been adamant that no one could hear it until it was complete.

I shouldn't have been surprised, but I was a little in awe of how proud I felt. He had accomplished something wonderful and I was honored to be a witness. I wanted to say something then to let him know how proud I was, but when I saw him watching me I knew it wasn't necessary.

I was enthralled by the clarity of each note echoing as though it were alive. Studio albums tend to have a glossy feel to them. The background noise is removed, replaced by a nice polished sound. But this was more real than that. This was live and unaltered. Each slide of fingers against the strings, each cough in the background made this familiar feeling come forth and connected you to truth in the music.

All the while I was aware of the closeness Eric maintained and how intently he was watching my reactions. When I felt his hand press gently against my collarbone, his open palm pressing flush to skin I didn't dare open my eyes which had closed without my notice. I breathed deeply and didn't move an inch.

My heart was beating so hard I was certain he could feel it beneath his hand. I was dizzy from his touch and proximity and the music. It all felt so surreal. I knew the moment he dipped his head towards me, but instead of meeting his lips as I so easily could have done I tipped my head back, exposing my neck to him. The first kiss he placed on my jaw sent a rush of blood to my head and I nearly feel back, but was caught as his other arm wrapped around my shoulders and held me to him.

I may have moaned or cried, which I wasn't sure. Either way he took this as an open invitation to coax my body down onto the couch. He could have easily done anything in that moment. I was delirious from the feel of lips on my body and the anticipation that had been building all day. Still, he didn't press his lips to mine. He nuzzled his head against my neck, my shoulder, the side of my face. When I couldn't stand it any longer I moved to kiss his lips only to feel him pull back. I couldn't hear his chuckle above the music still playing, but I felt the rumble through my chest.

His body was suspended above mine, his knees in between my legs that were spread as much as the couch would allow. We were almost touching but then again not quite. I had all but resigned myself to the idea that this was one giant tease when his lips finally reached the corner of my mouth. He laid a full, lingering kiss square on my bottom lip. It felt reverent, special in a way that distinguished this from any kiss we shared before. Then he kissed my top lip, pulling it into his mouth with increasing aggression. It forced my lips to part and he took advantage of that moment, using his tongue to open my mouth to him.

What started out as gentle and loving quickly turned into something much more passionate. We kissed endlessly and hungrily. His hands roamed my body, remaining as decent as possible under the circumstances, but only fueling my fevered state. Somewhere in that time the music ended, the headphones were discarded, the sun went down. I don't know if we noticed or didn't care. The world seemed to be suspended in time just for us.

I don't know who pulled away first or why we stopped. We didn't move for a long time, though. He laid with his head on my chest as we both tried to regain some sense of rational something. I was so far beyond thought at that point. I was trying to enjoy the moment, reveling in the feel of his weight on me and the deliciously numb sting of my swollen lips. I don't know how out of it I was, but he was in the middle of a sentence when I realized he was talking to me.

What he told me was that a man named Catfish Hennessey, a prominent figure in the indie world, wanted to distribute the record. This meant that the band could serve as their own label with complete creative control, but still benefit by getting their music out there. The piece of information that surprised me the most was that the boys were going to be playing their last show at Lou Pine's in a couple of weeks. Apparently Amelia had sanctioned a small, local tour before she was due in March. She was so goddamn Zen about the pregnancy that bit of news didn't surprise me one bit.

I didn't speak, but as we lay there together and he told me all their plans I began to feel as though things were changing. I didn't know what that meant yet, but I would find out soon enough.


	17. And It's No Wonder How We Got Here

**Chapter Seventeen: And It's No Wonder How We Got Here **

The aching familiarity of the wide dirt paved roads struck me with unexpected force as I found myself driving down them for the first time in so long. Driving was scary enough, it had been quite some time, but it was almost disorienting in such a place that I knew so well I could have closed my eyes to round each bend by memory. It had been so very long and the thing that perhaps struck me the most was that it had been just as long since I had been alone quite like this. There was not a soul for miles and the open, bumpy road stretched out before me all but guaranteed I would see no one for many more miles.

When I turned the rental car onto Hummingbird Lane it seemed as though I had never left. Maybe a part of me never had. Everything welled up so large in my chest it felt as though I could barely contain my own lungs. It felt like I was breathing a sigh of relief as I parked my car in the spot that had always been mine. When I took my first steps from the car I surveyed the great expanse of my Gran's land. The trees so yellow it intensified the sun streaming through them to create a sort of luminescent fairy-land around the old farm house.

"Have you been gone so long you forgot what it looked like?" At the sound of my Gran's voice, not distorted by miles and phone lines, tears filled my eyes. I rushed to the porch with blurry eyes and caught my grandmother in a hug. Nothing could have prepared me for how homesick I felt standing there.

"I missed you, Gran." I sniffled into her shoulder, trying to get a hold of myself.

"It's been too long, child." She simply said and released me to put her arm around my shoulder. "I made us lunch."

I grinned like a fool. God, I had missed her cooking.

"How was your flight?"

"So, tell me about this Eric. What's he like?" Gran was standing at the sink washing dishes as I sat on a stool next to her drying each dish dutifully as she placed in the drying rack. I was taken aback by her question since I took care never to spend too much time on the subject of Eric during our phone conversations. All I had really told her was that we sort-of lived together, something that I wasn't entirely sure that she approved of, but she wasn't openly judgmental like that. About certain things, anyway.

"He's…Eric," I cautiously replied. "Why do you ask?"

She stopped for a moment, probably to consider whether or not to divulge whatever information she had. After a long pause she placed the last dish in the rack and took the hand towel from me to dry her hands.

"Pam says that you two get along well these days, is all."

"Pam says what? Is that a euphemism I am unaware of?" What a big mouth.

"Oh, dear, don't be ridiculous. Is she wrong?" Gran was all innocence as she moved across the kitchen to wipe down the table. I thought about it for a moment and she didn't rush me. She was never the prying type, but she had this way about her that made you want to tell her things anyway.

"I think we are getting along just fine." I finally said. "We're good friends."

"Friends?" Gran asked skeptically and I could tell she was about to call me on my bullshit. "You always get that look when you talk about your friends?"

"What look?"

"Don't play dumb, it's unbecoming. You know exactly what I am talking about."

I laughed a bit uncomfortably and shook my head. "Gran, I really don't."

"Alright, fine, be that way." She had a mischievous glint in her eye, but she let the conversation turn to town gossip—she kept me abreast of Bon Temps goings on and filled me in on what had been happening since we last spoke.

* * *

"I am ridiculously full," my brother announced, leaning back in his chair, a movement so very reminiscent of my father. "Dinner was great, Gran."

"Yes, Adele. Just perfect, thank you." Crystal pushed her chair back from the table and Andy, my four year old nephew took the opportunity to crawl into her lap. It was strange to see this whole picture of my brother and his family. Of course Gran had told me many times about how mature my brother had become and what a wonderful father he was to his son, but seeing it in person was a little twilight zone. It wasn't that we didn't get along as children, but we were just never really close. When I left Bon Temps we made no effort to keep in touch. I'm sure that Gran gave updates on my life, just as she kept me informed of his, but it had been silent between us for years now.

"You are all welcome," she replied. "It is so wonderful to have my whole family in one place at last."

And it was nice. We sat at that table all night talking about our lives, sharing things that had happened to all of us and reminiscing about the past. Long after the sun set and Crystal put Andy to sleep in the guest bedroom the four of us stayed at that table drinking beer and talking. All of the years between us seemed like a distant memory, like they'd never really happened and somehow we had never really been apart. Close to three in the morning Crystal finally broke down in a yawn.

"I had better get her home," Jason announced and stood from his chair.

"Yes, I should probably get these weary bones to bed as well."

"Jeez, Gran, don't talk like that. You ain't a day over fifty." Jason wrapped his arm round her shoulders and lightly squeezed.

"My mind knows that, but try tellin' it to my body." She laughed at that, kissed us each on the cheek and said goodnight before retiring to her room.

Jason collected Andy from the guest room and stood in the doorway with his sleeping child slung over his should and his tired wife slumped against the doorframe. He looked so old just then, bits of gray peeking through his hairline in the moonlight, gently urging Crystal towards the car with a supportive arm. I followed them outside and took Crystal by the arm so that Jason would be free to put the child in his car seat.

"Goodnight, Sookie," Crystal said as I helped her into the car. "It was real nice to see you. You should come back more often." I don't know if I ever thought much about my sister-in-law but I realized that night that I liked her very much.

"We'll stay in touch," I insisted quietly so as not to wake Andy.

"I'd like that."

"Me too." We embraced briefly and then I walked around the other side of the truck as my brother was climbing in.

"Will y'all be alright to get home?"

"Oh, just listen to that accent," he joked. "I knew you weren't all Yankee. Yeah, we'll be fine. Crystal is right, it's been too long. We'll stay in touch." He leaned out the car door and hugged me.

"I'll see you soon, big brother."

"You'd better." He gave a small wave as they turned down the driveway.

I locked up the house, turned off the lights and climbed the stairs to the room I was staying in. It had been mine growing up and wasn't much different now, a little less decorated but it still had the same flowery wallpaper and four poster bed. There were a couple of messages on my phone and I checked them absently while I changed. Two were from Pam, checking in with me about nothing in particular and one was from Eric.

_happy thanksgiving. _

We hadn't spoken since I had left for Louisiana and in terms of texts it wasn't exactly revealing. I crawled under the covers and took the phone with me. Carefully, I pulled up his number and let it ring once before I put the phone to my ear. There was the possibility that he wouldn't answer being that it was nearly three in the morning, but something about the vague message was unsettling and I knew that I wouldn't be getting to sleep any time soon if I didn't talk to him first.

It rang twice more before he answered and from his voice it was pretty clear that I had woken him up.

"Hey, it's Sookie."

"Sookie who?" Ouch. It hadn't dawned on me that he would be angry that I didn't call. I had thought of calling right after I arrived, but it seemed like something a clingy woman would do and since we hadn't yet discussed what it was that we were to each other I didn't want to cross any invisible barriers.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly and turned on my side, placing the phone beneath my head and trying not to breathe too deeply in his ear. "You could have called if you wanted to talk."

"Funny, I was thinking the same." He sighed deeply and I heard rustling in the background. I had a sudden irrational thought that he might not be alone. That maybe he was more than just a little irritated with me and had decided that I wasn't want he wanted after all.

"I apologized," I sniffed, getting a little defensive.

He sighed again and there was a long silence. Finally, he spoke again. "I know you did. It's just—fuck it. Never mind." He didn't sound angry, more resigned if anything. That hurt more than when I thought he was angry so obviously I pushed him because I couldn't let it go.

"Just what?"

"I don't know. It's late and I'm half-asleep and I don't want to say something right now that I can't take back later."

"So be nice. Let's just be Sookie and Eric, roommates and occasional frenemies." I tried to smooth things over with a pleasant tone.

I heard him laugh and it sounded distant, like he pulled away from the phone. It was a reassuring sound. "Are we frenemies? I wasn't aware."

"Just sometimes. It's probably because you like me so much you don't know how to act around me."

"That's probably it," he replied sounding much more serious than I had intended for the comment to be.

Neither of us spoke for a while and I was concerned that perhaps he had fallen asleep on me. "You still there?" I barely whispered.

"Yes, Sookie, I'm here."

"Do you hate me?" I only half meant that, but even as I told myself I was joking around I hated how desperate it sounded.

He didn't seem to notice, though. "Never."

When I woke up the next morning I was overcome by the reality that I was leaving once again. I was torn, because I missed Eric and wanted to return to him, but I didn't want to leave Bon Temps either. Of course, Gran picked up on this right away. She made breakfast and we swung on the porch swing drinking coffee and savoring the last of the warm weather.

"I don't think I'll stay away so long next time," I mused out loud.

"I think that's a good idea," she replied.

"Do you ever wish I had stayed closer to home?"

"Not for one moment. I am so proud of how brave you were to go out into the world and make your own way. I don't know if you would have been happy here and all I have ever wanted was for you and your brother to be happy."

"Thank you, Gran. I think I am happy."

"Then so am I." She wrapped her arm around my shoulder and squeezed. I felt okay about leaving Bon Temps then. I knew that I would return.

* * *

It was late when I finally arrived home. The flight had been draining and the prospect of my warm bed was unbelievably alluring. Add to that the harsh winter weather that had greeted me once the plane touched down and I was positively single-minded in my pursuit of comfort and sleep. While I was wrenching my unwieldy luggage through my front door I was too distracted to notice Eric casually leaning against the far wall silently observing my efforts.

"Shit," I exclaimed sharply when I finally registered his presence. "Oh my god," I exhaled and brought my hand up to rest on my frantically beating heart. "How long have you been standing there? You scared me."

"Not long," he said. There was something in his voice that I couldn't ignore. A sadness, maybe. I wondered if he was still upset that I hadn't called him. A few seconds passed and he pushed off from where he was standing to come take my suitcase from me. I let him take it and followed him to my room.

"How was the flight?" Again, there was that _something _and it was like a word at the tip of my tongue, just out my reach. I knew it and couldn't put a word to it. It wasn't bad, per se, but I couldn't call it out. He seemed so intense, much more than his usual level of intensity. This was different. It was like he had a purpose.

The cold wind had been ripping through the night air and I knew that my cheeks were pink. I could feel a flush behind my chilled skin and I brought my hands up to cup my own face while I told him about my family. Having longed so for my bed I couldn't resist lying on top of the blankets and allowing him to follow as I recounted the enormous feast my Gran had prepared, the odd familiarity of returning home and my forgotten love of the south.

All the while we drifted closer, our bodies unconsciously seeking one another out, tangling together unbidden as we shared meaningless details from the days we had spent apart. The closer we got the less focused I was on the world around us and the more intent I became on Eric. Without giving it much thought I allowed my hands to explore underneath his t-shirt, causing him to jump unintentionally when my cold hands met his warm skin. Eventually we just stopped talking altogether. The only sound that surrounded us was the stereo of our own heavy breaths.

Dizzy with desire, my head swimming from the nearness of him I slid his shirt up and over his head, breaking contact only long enough to free it from between us. That action seemed to have ignited something within him and when we met again he wrapped his arms around my back and pulled me close to him.

We had kissed so many times since that day in the studio, we had spent so many nights making out wildly into the early hours, exploring one another and enjoying ourselves. That was always as far as I had allowed things to go. I was still trying to protect myself from some great unknown and the only way I had known to do that was to keep some semblance of distance between us. But when his hands slid down my back, beneath my shirt and dipped into the waistband of my jeans I didn't need to think or make any decisions because I knew in that very instant that what I needed was this. I wanted him and I trusted him and every fraction of my self was urging him on and holding back was the furthest thing from my mind.

We were already lying down, but it felt like we were falling. Everything was suddenly urgent and we struggled to remove our clothes, breathless and clumsy. I nearly elbowed Eric in the face as he slipped out of his jeans and I ripped my sweater over my head. He helped me out of my pants and it was then I saw that he was only in his boxers. I couldn't stop myself from kissing his stomach and made my way back to his mouth. His chest rumbled with a low growl as I nipped lightly as his neck. The way he was responding to me was definitely encouraging and any self-conscious apprehension I usually felt when we were close was washed away like it never existed.

Eric deftly removed my bra and discarded it somewhere over my shoulder. While I was distracted he flipped us so that he was on top and suddenly everything came to a halt.

"Are you sure this is alright?" He asked, looking deep into my eyes. It was so sincere, so real and it made me pull away to gather my thoughts. Was this was alright? He held himself above me, close enough that I could feel his chest rise as he breathed deeply against my own. We didn't move, our eyes locked and my heart still pounding so frantic that I thought there was no way he couldn't feel its rhythm.

I didn't say anything, maybe because I couldn't trust myself not to say anything foolish like 'I love you', because that was all I wanted to say to him then. I wanted him to know that whatever had been stopping me before, whatever had me holding on so tightly with fear was completely gone and the love and trust that I felt for him were so overwhelming that I wanted this more than anything before. This feeling was what I had always been waiting for, even though I hadn't known it until now.

A tear slid out the corner of my eye and I hoped that it went unnoticed when I dipped forward and kissed him with all that I had. And that was it; that was all it took.

He moved slowly in me, his hands at either side of my face slowly caressing the tears that were still falling. His lips made paths around my jaw, my chin, my lips; he kissed slowly and reverently all the while whispering praises of my beauty and heart. He told me how strong I was, how beautiful, how right this was, how good.

Our pace increased and when I felt like I couldn't hold back any longer I let my head fall back and welcomed the waves that crashed over me. When we were finished he went to the bathroom to clean up and returned to lie at my side. I was exhausted and couldn't speak even if I wanted to, but I rest my head on his chest as he hummed an unfamiliar song and tangled his fingers in the ends of my hair until I drifted off to sleep.

* * *

**Not Beta'd, I apologize for the mistakes. To a certain author who owes me quite a few chapters at this points ;), who knew that I would update more frequently than someone else? **

**I feel incredibly nervous about posting this chapter. It's been such a long time in the making and I feel insane worry about putting it out into the world. I wasn't expecting to post this today, but here it is.  
**

**I am so sorry if I don't respond to reviews/pm's. I appreciate each and every one of them (I love to read them) but life doesn't always permit me time away to respond. I want you to know what they mean to me though and I hope it does not discourage anyone from reviewing. **

**Nothing belongs to me, including the title of the chapter because that belongs to Langhorne Slim & The Law. **

Thank you.


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